The Knight before Mettarë
by annafan
Summary: AU silliness, loosely based on that made-for-TV gem, "The Knight Before Christmas". A Christmas present for Sian. Do not expect anything profound, or indeed anything other than complete crackfic. "Oops, it's gone and got itself a plot!"
1. Chapter 1

Loosely based on _The Knight Before Christmas _– a made-for-TV time-slip rom-com so cheesy you could spread it on bread dough and make an instant Quattro Formaggio.

Sian spotted this gem, and suggested we write a parody as a joint effort. But she's had a lot going on, so I thought I'd see if I could cobble something together on my own by way of a Christmas cheer up.

With profound apologies to everyone. My characters, my readers, the whole world… for doing this to them. Also, I have not seen the monstrosity in question, but I have got a script, and I have got the trailer. So off we go. Buckle up, it's gonna be a cheesy ride.

~o~O~o~

Faramir stamped his feet. Morgoth's balls, it was cold. A day to go to Mettare, and instead of being in the glow of warm fires and bright beeswax candles in the welcoming heart of his Uncle's townhouse in Minas Tirith, he was freezing his own balls off on patrol near the ruins of Osgiliath. In the fitful moonlight, he could just make out the bridge spanning the Anduin. Time and again, his father stressed the strategic importance of holding the crossing.

"Hail, brother." Boromir's voice cut through the chill night air. He held out a flask. "Some Tolfalas brandy to keep out the chill?"

"How goes it?" Faramir asked, taking the flask gratefully.

"All quiet so far. And yet I feel uneasy. The night seems filled with fell intent. Some witch-craft is afoot."

"I saw a rider earlier. Did he bring you tidings from Minas Tirith?"

"Aye, and from further afield. A letter from Theodred of Rohan. He fears there is a traitor in the court, moving against him. Someone has the ear of his father the king, and is spreading mischief. He goes so far as to say that he worries about being his father's only heir."

"A small family… Has he no kin in line of succession?"

"Alas, no. Theoden's sister died some twenty years past, and her husband too, slain by orcs. Their children, a boy and a baby girl, disappeared without trace. Their nurse was found slain, but of the children, nary a sign… But hearken, here comes Damrod."

Damrod, Faramir's lieutenant, bowed deeply. "Your orders, sirs?"

Boromir spoke. "Take your men and head inland to reconnoitre the approaches. I will head downstream with a small party. Faramir, take Firion and head upstream."

"The Valar speed you, brother," Faramir replied, touching his hand to his breast.

~o~O~o~

"Can I borrow your bike?"

Éomer looked up from his phone. His sister was standing in the doorway of the small sitting room. Already in her leathers, helmet tucked under her arm, blonde hair neatly plaited behind her back. The tinsel along the door frame was somewhat at odds with her Valkyrie appearance, and made Éomer struggle to suppress a smile. But suppress it he did, because he was damned if he was giving up without a struggle. Curse her cocky confidence; she knew he'd say yes. In a grumpy voice, he made a token effort at resistance.

"And have you scratch the paintwork again, Wyn?"

"I got Farouk down at the garage to fix it up again, didn't I? Good as new."

"Isn't yours fixed yet?"

"Farouk said after Christmas some time. He's waiting for a part. So..." Éowyn put on her best winsome expression. Her best winsome expression wasn't very good, but she was nothing if not a trier. "Can I borrow your bike?"

Éomer grunted. "You break it, you fix it."

"Ta! You're an angel. Love you..." Éowyn grinned broadly, and made for the front door, pausing to kiss Éomer on the cheek as she passed.

"You mean you love my bike," Éomer said, but he couldn't help the twitch of an answering smile.

"I'm going to grab some last minute presents for the kids. Late night shopping and all that."

The kids were "Uncle" Theo's girlfriend's children. Éowyn doted on them, Éomer knew. Why she kept banging on about how she wasn't bothered with having a bloke and a family, when she went gooey eyed whenever they pulled out the box of lego… He gave his head a shake. He knew full well why she kept banging on about that. The bloke from back when she was on a tour of duty in Estonia. Top bloke. Éomer had liked him. Fantastic soldier. Fantastically brave. Fantastically nice. With (as it turned out) a fantastic fiancée. But it wasn't something either of them mentioned.

With a last cheery wave, Éowyn slammed the door behind her. Éomer shook his head. Sisters. Who'd have 'em? Then his face broke into a smile despite himself. It wasn't often both of them were on leave at the same time, and to both have leave over Christmas was a rare treat indeed.

Outside, Éowyn wheeled the Yamaha out of the garage, gunned the throttle and headed for the centre of town. No snow – this was Berkshire, after all, but the Christmas lights were pretty. Éowyn loved being home with the family. She couldn't remember arriving at Uncle Theo's; she'd been just a baby. But he was as much her father as any blood relative could be.

Things had hit a rough patch back when she was coming to the end of primary school, when Auntie Sue died. But together the three of them had got through it, and five years later, Theo had taken up with Jane and her two kids, so Christmases (when she was on leave, that was) were filled with a built-in excuse to play with toys.

She left the bike by the kerb on the high street, then went into her favourite toy shop. No prizes for guessing what would go down well with Kelly – it had to be the lego "Starkiller duel" set. Seven year old Kelly wanted to grow up to be Rey. Or maybe a wookie – a "lady wookie", as she had said very insistently. For four year old Callum… Well, she knew Uncle Theo had bought him a station to go with his wooden railway set, so the obvious thing was an engine shed. Delighted with her purchases, she stowed them safely in her rucksack, and went back to the bike.

~o~O~o~

Faramir and Firion struggled through the undergrowth. It was dark now; the moon had gone behind a cloud.

Suddenly from the shadows several arrows whistled through the air. Faramir ducked behind a tree, nocking an arrow to the string as he did so, and loosed a shot in return. Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of Firion, his face twisted in pain. The boy had a black fletched shaft protruding from his leg; nonetheless he too nocked an arrow to the string.

A glint of dull metal two score paces away, towards the river bank. Faramir sent another arrow into the air. He was rewarded with a guttural cry, and the splash of a body tumbling into the water. He knew now where the enemy was, but not how many. Curse the cloud cover. Another whistle, and the leaves next to him rustled as an arrow buried itself in the bark of the trunk behind him. Firion's bow twanged, and there was another thud and shout of pain as his arrow hit home.

"Go, back to your brother. Get the news of the ambush back to him. I can't run. I'll hold them here while you escape."

"No, 'tis certain death."

"But you know I'm right." Firion sagged down against the boulder behind him. Another couple of arrows cut through the air just beside them. "You haven't got much time..."

Suddenly, from beside the river bank, a blinding flash of white light blossomed. In the afterglow, Faramir could see the bodies of the orcs, scattererd like ears of corn blasted by a harvest storm. Through the glow, a figure in grey robes stepped towards him As Faramir's eyes recovered from the flash, he recognised the figure.

"Mithrandir," he gasped in wonder.

The wizard knelt down beside Firion.

"I will look after your comrade and return him to your brother."

"You speak as if I am not to come with you."

"No, a different fate awaits you," Mithrandir spoke. His voice took on a solemn tone. "The quest you have searched for long and hard, these many years, begins this day. You shall travel to faraway lands, see things undreamed of. Things of wonder: flying steel dragons and horses, magic boxes that make merry. Things of terror: wars of horror, weapons beyond your imagining. "You must meet the horseman whose horse is stabled in the sky, who will turn the tide of battle, and the swordsman who is no man, who will fulfil a prophecy, and slay an ancient enemy. Together they will change the future of this world. And will bring you face to face with your destiny." Mithrandir stood and held out his staff at arms length, pointing back to the white glow in the distance. He intoned some words in Elvish, and suddenly, within the glow, a swirling tunnel appeared, stretching into a distance beyond imagining. "There lies your path, Faramir son of Denethor. The Valar speed you." Grasping his bow, Faramir stepped forward. Swallowing his fear he advanced into the swirling lights. For good or ill, he would embark on this quest.

~o~O~o~

Things of wonder, indeed! He found himself on a street at night – but what a night. The brightest lights, brighter than chandeliers with a thousand candles, banished the darkness. The lights were of many colours – waterfalls of lights, snowflakes of lights. Strung across the street between the buildings, sleighs such as they used in the mountains were picked out, drawn by shining, glittering deer with antlers, driven by toy men, plump, jolly, dressed all in red.

So intent was he on the lights suspended above his head, he collided with a man hurrying in the opposite direction.

"Your pardon, good sir..."

Faramir's apology was cut off by the man's brusque reply. The reply was a form of the Common Tongue, but not a dialect he had heard before. Faramir wasn't sure he recognised all the words, but the tone suggested the sentiment was an invitation to visit the frozen wastes of Angband… and none too politely expressed either.

Fixing his attention on the street before him so as not to collide with anyone else, he began to explore his new surroundings. The street was clean and well laid-out – pavements for those on foot were raised above the level of the gutters, with a central pathway for, he presumed, wagons. But admirably clean – they must have a veritable army of night soilmen to ensure that not a trace of dung was to be seen anywhere.

A family coming the other way paused. The two children nudged one another and giggled.

"Mum, mum, it's Robin Hood!"

The woman holding the children's hands gave a slightly uncertain smile in his direction, then muttered to the children, "He's probably doing a panto or something. Wants us to buy tickets."

Again, most of it made sense, but some of the words were new to him. "Panto"? And who was "Robin Hood"? While he pondered on this, the woman steered the children round him, still looking as though she wasn't quite sure of him.

From behind him he heard a male voice shout out.

"Oi, you in the green. Bit tall for one of Santa's elves, aren't you?"

He turned to see a couple of men standing outside what appeared to be a hostelry. Each held a tankard of beer, and was smoking pipeweed, the sort Mithrandir was so inordinately fond of – but rolled into thin tubes rather than in pipes. They were at the merry stage of drunkenness, as far as he could tell, but he read them for the kind of fellows whose mood might turn in an instant. Best to cross the street, he felt.

He stepped off the pavement, and all hell broke loose. There was a roaring noise, then a screech, then he was hit an enormous blow from behind and found himself flung to the ground, landing with a heavy thud. Both winded and with a blow to the head, he lay in the gutter. The world swam before him.

In the middle of the road, a machine of shining metal lay on its side. "Steeds of steel": the words came back to him from somewhere, but where, in his dazed state, he couldn't quite place. To the side of it, lay a figure in leather hauberk and leggings, wearing a helm – a strange, spherical helm with the eyes covered by some sort of smoked glass. Gingerly, the figure got to his feet, testing his movements seemingly to make sure nothing was broken, then made his way towards where Faramir lay. Faramir's sight swam – there was something slightly off about the figure, but he couldn't make out what it was. He managed to speak, his voice coming out in a croak. For the second time that night, he apologised.

"Your pardon, good sir."

The knight (for such he presumed it was) reached up and unfastened the chin strap of his helm, then lifted it clear of his head.

"Dude, I'm a girl!"

Faramir stared, astonished, at the young woman with the delicate features and long braid of blonde hair. And… now he knew what was off about the figure… the elegant curves of her body, clad in black leather. His addled mind whirled. _Flowers fair, and maidens fairer, have I seen, but none as fair as thee._ Then he passed out.


	2. Chapter 2

"Thank god you're here." Éowyn got up from the plastic chair she'd been sitting on in the waiting room.

"I can't believe you've pranged my bike again." Éomer sounded genuinely cross.

"It wasn't my fault – he stepped out right in front of me."

"Why are you still here? Why not just leave him with the paramedics?"

Éowyn heaved a sigh. "It's bleedin' chaos round here." She gestured at the full waiting room, with patients ranging from drunks clutching bloodied cloths to head wounds through to small children with plastic items from Christmas crackers stuck up their noses. There was even a plump middle aged woman crouched in the corner throwing up into a cardboard sick bowl. "The call handler said it would be 3 hours for an ambulance if it wasn't immediately life-threatening, so I got a mini cab and brought him here myself."

"I still don't see why you're still here..."

"I just want to make sure he's okay. I knocked the poor guy out."

Éomer fished in his jacket pocket. "Here's the keys to Uncle Theo's car. If you give me the keys to the bike, I'll get it back to the flat..." He was interrupted by one of the nurses calling out.

"Miss Earle?"

Éowyn turned round. There was the nurse, and next to her, still looking a bit unsteady on his feet, but with a lot more colour in his cheeks, was the mystery man in the green fancy dress costume. Éomer turned to look as well, and took in the slightly odd looking dress, the shoulder length dark hair, the wiry build.

"Ah, now it becomes clear. I see why you're hanging around. You, dear sis, have a type. And he's it," he muttered under his breath.

"Shut up," Éowyn hissed. "I do not have a type. And even if I did, right now I'm not looking. And in any case, I am certainly not so bleedin' desperate that I've taken to picking up random blokes I've just run down."

In the time it took her to say this, the nurse walked the stranger over to them. He made a slightly strange gesture – hand to his chest, a slight bow of the head.

"Faramir, son of Denethor, at your service. I am most heartily sorry for the inconvenience I have put you to."

Behind him, the nurse struggled to keep a professionally straight face, but couldn't quite suppress an eye-roll at this wordy introduction.

"Are you this gentleman's next of kin?" she asked.

"Who, me? No…" Éowyn flushed. "I was… err… it was me who knocked him down. I mean, he just stepped out of nowhere, there was no way I could have stopped. Is he okay?"

"Well, medical confidentiality means I can't actually discuss it with you. But we do have a bit of a problem, in that I'm not getting very far with establishing his next of kin."

"Kin?" the man said, still sounding a little dazed. "I have many kin… my father, my brother, my uncles and aunts, many, many cousins." He gave a smile at this point. "Some of them, especially the cousins, much more trouble than they are worth."

"Do you have a phone number for any of them?" the nurse said, sensing an opening.

"_Phone_? I know not what this word means."

Éowyn's eyes widened in surprise, and this time the nurse made no attempt to hide the eye-roll. "See what I mean? This is about as far as we've got with him."

Éowyn gestured to one of the plastic chairs, and the man sat down, looking grateful that he didn't have to stay steady on his feet any more. Éowyn sat next to him.

"Okay, so you have a father, and brother, and uncles and aunts. How do we contact them?" she asked.

"You cannot. They are not in this world. They are in the world from whence I came."

Behind his back, Éomer tapped a finger to his forehead. Éowyn fixed him with the sort of death ray stare only siblings can manage, and he looked suitably subdued. She then tried a new tack.

"Would you let the nurse talk to me about what's the matter with you? If you don't mind, that is."

The man nodded to the nurse and said "By all means, mistress healer. Do tell this good lady what you have found, by means of your magical devices and most intricate and clever engines. The strange tube in which you made me lie, which made so much noise, was most discomfitting, but it seemed to reveal much about my condition."

The nurse gave Éowyn another look, this time saying _I get many, many weird patients in here, but this guy is off the scale_, then managed to compose herself.

"Thank you. Well, this young man – Faramir, he says his name is – has taken quite a blow to the head. We did do an MRI scan – the _strange tube._" (Here she struggled as the corner of her mouth twitched; Éowyn had a feeling that the next time she was down the pub with her colleagues, the retelling of this story would mean she didn't have to buy a drink all evening.) "So, the MRI scan – no fracture, no subdural haemotoma… That is, there's no bleeding or pressure on the brain. But we think he's got a condition called retrograde amnesia." She turned to Faramir. "That's when you can't remember anything of the moments just before your head injury."

Faramir interjected at this point. "This is true, good lady. I can recall my previous life in detail, but not how I came to be here. It is most disturbing to my equilibrium; I feel there were important events leading up to this state of affairs, and important information which was entrusted to me, which it is vital that I remember, but it floats within my troubled mind, just out of reach."

The nurse shot him another look. "The bang on the head also seems to have left him very confused – but that on its own isn't grounds for keeping him in here - and talking like someone out of a Dickens novel. That's not unheard of – there's a case in the textbooks about a woman from Birmingham who started speaking with an Australian accent after a head injury."

"Could have been worse," said Éomer. "It could have been the other way round." Éowyn dug him in the ribs.

"Anyway, we need to discharge him – the on call doctor will be around to sign off his discharge in a minute. He could do with having somewhere to go. But if necessary, I can give him a referral to the local shelter, see if they've got any places. Not sure they will have this close to Christmas though." The nurse looked expectantly at Éowyn and Éomer.

"Stop it," Éomer said to his sister.

"Stop what?"

"The puppy dog look. We can't take in waifs and strays, Uncle Theo already has a full house for Christmas..."

"But he has nowhere, he's still confused..."

"And he could be a complete nutter. We don't need a mad axe murderer for Christmas."

The dark haired man interrupted at this point. "I can assure you that I am not mad, sir, even though my wits are not as sharp as they customarily are. And I harbour no ill will towards you or..." He paused and there was a note of disappointment in his voice. "Your wife."

"Sister," Éomer corrected.

"And I would not importune on your good will," the man continued, in a noticeably more cheerful voice. Éomer's eyes narrowed. He shot a quick look at his sister. Mercifully oblivious. This more than anything reassured Éomer. His sister had lousy taste in men… either unavailable, or bastards. If she hadn't noticed this one was interested in her, the guy was probably sound as a pound. If a bit odd. Actually, make that a lot odd. But still…

"Okay then – he can kip the floor if I get the bedroom, and you take the sitting room floor. And _you_ have to explain to Jane why we've brought a nutter home with us."


	3. Chapter 3

Faramir sat in the passenger seat, feeling both ill-at-ease and strangely excited. However this strange state of affairs had come about – how he wished he could remember – there was no doubting that this was an adventure, a veritable quest, beyond his wildest imaginings.

The tall blond man had got out of the… what was it called again? The car. Presumably short for carriage. To retrieve the steed of steel. Now his sister, his very beautiful sister, was steering the strange wagon. A wagon with no horses. Powered by who knew what wizardry or devilry. Terrifyingly fast, with a casual mastery of the situation that added to the mixture of fear and exhilaration. He sneaked a side-long glance at her. She was every bit as lovely as that first moment she had removed her helm. And for some reason, some blessed reason, she had found it in her heart to make herself his protector in this strange realm.

He turned his head, and gazed out of the window at the bright lights dangling across the street.

"They are so beautiful."

"Christmas lights," the young woman said. (Wyn, he thought he'd heard the man call her. Mistress Earle, the healer had called her. What an extraordinary coincidence. With her colouring and hair, she'd have made a true daughter of Eorl had she been born in his world). "Christmas is our mid-winter celebration. Some people have religious beliefs about it, some just enjoy the party."

"We have something like it – Mettare. But nowhere near as bright lights as this. Some wizardry at work, I'll wager. Like the fireworks Mithrandir makes to entertain the hobbits."

Éowyn wasn't quite sure how to reply to this stream of words which meant nothing to her. And the mention of wizardry freaked her out a little. Mostly she was finding she felt comfortable in Faramir's company, but every so often he'd come out with one of these comments which reminded her she was dealing with someone a bit bonkers. She decided to change the subject. "Do you like music?"

"Yes, very much." He smiled at her. She reached out and pressed a button below the sloping window in front of them.

Suddenly the most vile cacophony Faramir had ever heard filled the car. He slapped his hands over his ears. "That is not music. That is the noise of the forges of Orodruin."

"Dunno what you're worrying about, can't beat a bit of thrash metal," Éowyn shouted above the din, giving a broad grin while turning the knob between her fingers. The cacophony subsided to a mere ear-grating background noise. "It's Éomer's playlist. Here..." she pressed a button, and the hideous noise was replace by a woman singing, or perhaps more accurately alternately sighing and warbling, with drums in the background. "This button takes you through all the radio stations. Keep pressing it till you find music you like."

Rather cautiously, as if it might bite him, Faramir started to work his way through the stations. This land's minstrels seemed to favour a lot of drums and discord, and a certain Bacchanalian excess in their approach. But finally, after a dozen or so attempts, he stumbled upon something really quite beautiful – voices, and what sounded a bit like viols, with woodwind and brass, used sparingly to great effect.

Éowyn cast her eye over to the glowing display on the radio. "Why does it not surprise me that you've landed up on Radio 3," she said, with a sigh. She rolled her eyes, but there was a slight quirk of her lips, as if trying to suppress a smile.

Faramir realised he was being teased, even though he couldn't understand the import of her words. He replied, deadpan, "This music is not to your taste? And yet you seemed to like the din that we started with. Can it be that you too did not escape our earlier collision unscathed? Perhaps the fall damaged your hearing in some way."

Éowyn pursed her lips, realising that her attempt to pull his leg had been rather neatly turned round. "It's just a bit old-fashioned. Like the way you talk. Which is why I'm not surprised."

"Old fashioned? You make me sound like my maiden aunt. The bane of my cousins' lives."

"That's the second time you've mentioned your cousins. Just enough for me to think they're younger than you, and perhaps a bit badly behaved." She shot him a side long glance and added, "I bet they'd like a good bit of thrash metal." This time, Éowyn was definitely smiling.

"Do you know, I think they would at least affect to do so, if for no other reason than to annoy our aunt."

"Well, so long as you don't annoy my aunt… well, sort of aunt. Because it's her we have to persuade to let you to stay."

"I shall be on my best behaviour. I shall even endeavour to make appreciative remarks about this _thrash metal_ if you think it would help," he said, smiling back.

Éowyn gave a laugh. "It wouldn't. The thrash metal, that is. The good behaviour probably would."

~o~O~o~

Éowyn sat on the floor in the doorway while Éomer made up the pull-out bed in the room they used while on leave. The dark-haired stranger stood in the corner, propping up the wall.

"On the whole that didn't go too badly," she remarked.

"I'm just sad I missed the initial reaction. I was expecting Jane to have a cow," Éomer said.

Faramir frowned in confusion at this strange idiom, but the siblings were so used to chattering at high speed he found it difficult to get a word in edgeways, especially as their form of the common tongue was not really one he was used to – it seemed stripped down, much sparer than the version he was used to, but at the same time with lots of additional words. Many of them, he suspected, that one wouldn't want to use in front of his Aunt Ivriniel, or his father. Both siblings seemed to swear like troopers.

"Surprisingly Uncle Theo was pretty laid back about it all. But you're right, Jane wasn't best pleased. Freaked out a bit about how did we know he was okay and not going to murder us in our beds..."

"You're not, are you?" Éomer asked Faramir. "It'd be nice if you didn't, seeing as how I'm sleeping next to you and would probably be your first victim…"

Faramir guessed he was being teased again, and replied, conversationally, "Would it be all right if I said I'd strangle you – no bloodstains for Jane to clean up in the morning, so it wouldn't be too much trouble for her."

"Yeah, well, you'd be stuck with strangling him," Éowyn retorted, "Because we put all your sharp, pointy metal stuff in the fencing cupboard and locked the door. We keep all that stuff safely locked up from the kids. For stage props, they were pretty damn realistic."

Yet more new words. Which one to ask about first? What were _stage props_? More or less randomly, though, Faramir found himself saying "Fencing?"

"Sword fighting," Éomer explained. "Wyn is (it pains me to say it) bloody good at it. Top three finishes in épée and foil, won the sabre in the women's competition at last year's joint forces competition."

"Joint forces?"

"Army, navy and air force. We're both in the army."

Faramir tried not to show his surprise. A woman in the army? He looked at her, and once more thought to himself _daughter of Eorl_. She would make a very convincing shieldmaiden. If such things existed in these latter days. He wasn't quite sure of the state of things in Rohan. Then corrected himself. If such things existed in this strange new world. Then it occurred to him to puzzle over another word, _air force,_ but before he could do so he realised the conversation had moved on.

"… and find him some clothes and a towel… I'll show you where the bathroom is," Éomer said.

A voice called up from dowstairs. "Wyn, can you unload the tumble drier and put the laundry away?" Éowyn got to her feet and padded off downstairs.

~o~O~o~

"Oh God, sorry!" Éowyn realised she'd run, full-tilt, into Faramir. Then… "Oh God! Sorry!" She turned bright red as she realised… A wet, half-naked Faramir clad only in a towel, on his way back from the bathroom to Éomer's bedroom.

She stepped back rapidly, face flaming, clutching the heap of laundry to her chest. She couldn't look him in the face. Though this probably wasn't helping, as it occurred to her that she was now staring at his chest instead. A toned, muscled chest, with a generous dusting of dark hair, the sort of chest you could press your face against, feel the warm skin against your cheek, breathe in the scent of warm male body. _Oh God. _She looked down rapidly, trying not to linger on what appeared to be a washboard stomach, or on the V of muscles leading downwards, trying not to wonder what was beneath the towel, trying not to register the muscled legs. Feet. Surely feet were safe to look at.

"Uh… sorry. Sorry, I keep saying sorry." Bloody hell, where had her brain gone? "Washing! I mean, I'm sorting the washing. I'll just go and sort the washing." She slid along the wall, back to it. As an afterthought she added, "Ask Éomer to find you some clothes. Ummm, he's a lot taller than you. But there might be some my ex left that would fit you." She bolted for Jane and Theo's room and shut the door firmly behind her, dropping the pile of laundry on the bed, then flopping down beside it, her head in her hands.

She took a deep breathe. Where the hell had this come from? This was the bloke she'd nearly run down. The bloke who appeared to be a sandwich short of a picnic. In fact, about half a loaf of bread with all the fillings short of a picnic. Where the hell had this come from?

Who was she kidding? It was pretty damn obvious where this had come from. Now he was out of the peculiar fake-medieval clothes, she could see he was a fine looking specimen, and pretty ripped too. Not in an obvious body-builder sort of way, more the sort of wiry build she saw in men who went in for a lot of rock-climbing. Any woman with enough of a pulse for the blood to still be circulating would probably have responded the same way. And she was in the middle of a long, dry patch. But… the fact remained: he was probably nuts and she didn't know a thing about him

She gave her head a shake, exhaling. Right, there was only one way forward. Pretend that hadn't happened. Denial, denial, denial. Contrary to what her best mate Liv back in 61st Company said about her approach to life, denial was a perfectly healthy coping mechanism. She was determined to keep any urges in that direction firmly under wraps. Even if she had to resort to the fabled army "bromide in the tea" method.

Methodically, she began to sort out the sheets and towels into the appropriate drawers.

~o~O~o~

Much later that night, Faramir lay in the darkness, listening to Éomer snoring fit to rouse the Halls of Mandos. The most peculiar of days, and frustrating too. He knew there was something vital he should remember about all of this, some information he'd been given. But it hovered, annoyingly, just out of reach.

He felt considerable relief too, that somehow he had fallen in with a family who had taken him into their household and made him at home. A household which included within its number the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

Not that he held high hopes in that direction. He seemed to have embarrassed her dreadfully colliding with her while half-naked. His cheeks burned at the memory. Clearly, for all her unconventional dress, she was a respectably raised maiden who was mortified by being exposed to him in a state of undress. He wondered if there was any way he could discreetly raise the issue with her brother and ask how he might make amends. Probably not, on reflection, well not if he didn't want to be soundly beaten by an angry and protective elder brother. He rolled over and pulled the quilt – a sublimely comfortable quilt -over his head, and tried to sleep.

Sleep, when it finally came, was haunted by dreams of running his fingers through flowing, liquid golden hair.


	4. Chapter 4

Faramir woke to a foot in the guts. A very small foot. Followed by another. It seemed he was being used as a stepping stone on the way to somewhere more interesting.

"Éomer, Éomer, Éomer, get up, get up, get up..."

Faramir looked up from the lower of the two beds to see two small children, apparently sitting on Éomer's head and torso

"Park today. You promised."

"Gnnnung..." Éomer lifted the smaller of the two, a little boy with red curly hair, off his stomach.

"It's Christmas Eve today," said the older, a girl with neatly plaited brown hair and freckles. She added seriously, in the tone of someone imparting a great secret of the universe. "That means it's Christmas tomorrow." Then she replaced her brother, bouncing up and down on Éomer's stomach. He lifted her off with a moan of "Urgh, bladder."

"What time is it?" he added, groggily.

"Breakfast time," said the little girl. "I'm having unicorn hoops."

Éomer's groping hand found the small oblong object Faramir had seen him looking at the previous night. In his grasp, it lit up. "Oh god. 7.00 am. I thought I was on leave."

"Park, park, park," said the little boy.

"This afternoon," said Éomer. Wyn and I have to go with Uncle Theo to see your granny Mary this morning."

~o~O~o~

Which was more-or-less how Faramir found himself sitting cross-legged on the floor building towers out of multi-coloured, interlocking bricks for the little boy – whose name turned out to be Callum – while his sister Kelly sat near by carefully colouring in a picture of a prancing horse (with horn) garlanded with flowers.

At the other end of the kitchen, their mother stood at a counter baking. The kitchen itself was like nothing Faramir had ever seen, a room of sparkling white and shiny metal and light-coloured wood. No open fire, nor even a stove. Instead there seemed to be more miraculous engines and contrivances that heated food without the need for Jane to haul in wood.

"So, have any of your memories come back?"

"Sadly, not of the last few days, Mistress Jane," Faramir replied. "I have no explanation for how I came to be here, nor any real understanding of where I am." He paused for a moment, adding several blocks to the current tower. "It troubles me, I must admit."

Jane dusted the flour from her hands and looked down at him. "I think Wyn's guess is probably the best one – that you'd been either in some sort of pantomime or on your way home from a fancy dress, and the timing of the bang to your head means your brain's somehow decided you are the person you were pretending to be. That's why you have all these confused memories. You know, knights in armour, and sword fights, and arrows, and fights with the bad guys."

Faramir smiled. "Robin Hood, she keeps saying. But I know not this story."

"I'll get it," said Kelly and leapt to her feet. Moments later she returned with a book with brightly coloured pictures. She held it out to him. "Read us a story… Please." Faramir's heart lifted – he remembered that he loved books and libraries. But then fell when he realised he could not make head nor tail of the script in which it was written. He flushed with embarrassment.

His words stumbling slightly, he said, "I fear that I… I seem to have forgotten how to read." He blinked and swallowed. This discovery had hit him harder than almost anything that had happened to him so far.

"That's okay," Kelly replied, with an air of pride. "I'm in year 2 now – I can read it to you." And she proceeded to do so, and the next ten minutes passed amicably enough with tales of weak Prince John, the evil Sheriff of Nottingham, the brave outlaw Robin Hood and the beautiful Maid Marion. At the end of it, Faramir had recovered his composure somewhat.

"Well, whoever I was pretending to be before the bang to the head, I don't think it was Robin Hood. My story has no Maid Marion, and though it does have an absent king, he and his heirs have been absent for millennia."

"Cup of tea," asked Jane, holding out a steaming mug. Faramir got to his feet, feeling rather stiff after so long on the floor with the children, and went over to the counter where she stood. He took a sip – it wasn't quite what he had expected, but wasn't unpleasant. Trying to make conversation, he gestured at the pictures on the wall.

"These are remarkable likenesses." He pointed to the photo of a blonde little girl of about 8, astride a piebald pony.

"That's Wyn when she was little, before I knew them. She and Éomer were both horse mad. Not that Theo and his late wife had lots of money, just enough for a few lessons, but when they got to be teenagers, they started trading jobs in the local stables, mucking out, grooming, that sort of thing, for rides. It stuck with Éomer – that's him in his full guardsman's get-up." Jane pointed to a picture diagonally down the wall.

In the picture, Éomer sat astride a very fine chestnut. He wore a shining breastplate over a red military jacket, and a shining helm with a plume of horsehair flowing from its apex.

"Guardsman first class, he is now," Jane added. "Theo's ever so proud of him." She pointed to another photo a few across.

The figure in this picture wore a helmet and loose tunic of some sort, a sandy colour with smudges of darker colour. Ideal to blend into the background; Faramir recognised camouflage when he saw it. This would be ideal for reconnaissance in the sandy semi-desert of the Debatable Lands. He looked more closely. Those grey-blue eyes, those long, surprisingly dark lashes – he felt as if he would know them anywhere. Wyn.

"She's a field medic in the infantry. Theo was worried sick when she first joined up. I think he's a bit old fashioned about that sort of thing, didn't like the idea of a girl going to war."

Faramir nodded. "I can see that. I would fear for her safety if I were him." Then he looked thoughtful for a moment, and added, "Don't tell her I said that."

Jane grinned. "Your secret's safe with me."

"Didn't she want to be a cavalry rider like her brother?" he asked, glancing back at the photo of a younger Wyn astride her pony.

"She was furious about that. Back when she signed up, they didn't take women into the Household Cavalry. It's only this year the first woman's joined. Mind you, I think she's actually seen more front-line action that Éomer – Afghan, Syria, Iraq."

None of the names meant anything to Faramir, so he contented himself with a closer inspection of those beautiful eyes.

~o~O~o~

Theo's mother sat in the upright armchair next to her bed, a crocheted blanket in various shades of pink tucked over her knees. Theo sat on the upright chair beneath the window, Éowyn and Éomer perched on the bed. Each cradled a cup of tea awkwardly – a vital prop for this sort of occasion. It meant that when conversation flagged (which it did, frequently), they could fill the uncomfortable gaps with a sip of tea. Right now, though, they'd have given anything for an uncomfortable silence. For sadly, the old woman was in mid rant.

Granny Mary, or Nan for short, had never really liked their original foster mother, Sue. But while younger, in possession of her marbles, she'd managed to stay reasonably polite about this dislike. Now, with the onset of dementia, the brakes were off (along with any grasp on what it might, or might not be appropriate to say to a widower). Theo gritted his teeth and gripped the handle of the cup tightly.

"Her and her heathen ways… Never did hold with it. All that gadding about to Stonehenge for the Solstice, all a load of nonsense."

"It was the nineties, Mam. She was a New Age traveller, and I loved her for it. I didn't share her beliefs, but they were good beliefs. All about the good in nature, and the balance of forces for good and evil in people's minds, and how we had a choice what life force to embrace." Theo tried to keep his voice level.

"Mind you, she calmed down a bit when the kids were fostered with you, I'll give her that. Nasty, smelly Gypo kids, though. Dunno why social services didn't just put them in a home. What became of them, Theo love?"

"We're right here," Éowyn said, tightly.

"But you're all grown up. My Theo's only got them little snotty brats social services foisted on him. Who are you two?"

"This is Wyn and Éomer, Mam. They're all grown up now."

"No they're not. And why are you so old? You look like my Theo, but you're all old..." The old woman began to cry. Éowyn swallowed. She'd never got on with the old woman, but whatever their differences, she wouldn't have wished this on her worst enemy.

"Have a piece of cake, Nan," said Éomer, holding out a plate with a slice of the Christmas cake Jane had sent with them. To his relief, it distracted her briefly. Then the conversation circled round over the same ground again. And again. Eventually, after a couple of hours, they felt able to say their goodbyes and leave.

It was a very subdued threesome who sat down to lunch when they got back home.

"The usual?" Jane asked with a sigh.

"I think she's getting worse," said Theo.

"She's certainly getting more racist," said Éomer, bitterly.

"Or worse at hiding it," Éowyn. "I think she always felt that way underneath." She caught Faramir looking at her with a mixture of confusion and concern. "Éomer and I were born into a travelling family. Our parents were killed in a car crash, we were cut out the wreckage by the fire brigade, Uncle Theo and Auntie Sue took us in. Granny Mary doesn't think much of travellers – either the new sort like Auntie Sue was, or the old sort like us."

"Pikeys, Gypos, we had the whole works," Éomer added, angrily.

Jane reached across the table and patted his hand. "My Dad always used to say it was what you made of yourself that mattered. How you treated people. Ignore the old bat." She glanced apologetically at Theo. "Sorry, love. But she is, you know she is."

Éowyn got up from the table and left the room. Faramir half rose to follow her, but Theo gestured for him to stay put. She returned moments later with a wooden box, which she placed on the table. It was carved, the sort of interlinked knotwork design which in Faramir's world was typical of Rohan.

"This is just about the last thing we have left from our birth family," she said.

She opened the lid. There, on a folded woollen cloth, nestled two broaches of the sort that might hold cloaks in place. They were enamelled bronze, equal to the finest workmanship Faramir had seen come out of the northern lands. On one, a white horse galloped across a field of green. On the other, a pale hand grasped the hilt of a sword, picked out in silver filigree. Faramir guessed the horse must be Éowyn's, the sword Éomer's. But he guessed wrong.

"When I was a child, I always wondered why I got the sword and Éomer the horse… Though I guess it makes sense, seeing as he went into the cavalry, and I got good at fencing."

"May I," he asked. Éowyn nodded and he picked up her broach. It sat heavily in his hand. Then suddenly he felt a tingle as if some mysterious power was at work. He also felt a sense of incredible antiquity. And of homecoming.

It seemed a moment of significance, but glancing around him at the family he saw them happily engaged in everyday chatter, oblivious to the strange rush that had passed through him. Even Éowyn simply smiled politely. Only Uncle Theo seemed to have registered anything amiss in his expression; he was looking at him, a thoughtful expression on his face.


	5. Chapter 5

Éomer and Éowyn had been given the task of clearing the table while the rest of the family went out to "collect the tree", whatever that meant. Faramir sat on one of the stools by the high counter where the family broke their fast in the mornings. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of red. He turned… yes, there it was, slinking along the bottom of the fence, blasted pest.

He grabbed a kitchen knife from the block on the counter and opened the door to the garden. Thank heavens the chickens were nowhere to be seen, safely in the wooden shed, he presumed. Strange that they were not out foraging in the grass at this time of day. He took aim with the knife and threw, but at the last moment, the fox moved and the knife embedded itself harmlessly in the wooden fence.

"Faramir," Éowyn's voice yelled from the doorway behind him. But he was already intent on the hunt. He had the animal cornered. He managed to grab it by the scruff of its neck, but it squirmed, trying desperately to escape. Any moment now, it would wrest itself from his grasp. Without thinking, he threw it through the opening into the strange round chicken run that took up most of the garden. Once surrounded by the netting, it wouldn't be able to escape, and he would be able to dispatch it at his leisure. The chickens would be safe.

"What on earth are you doing, Faramir?"

Head first, he dived through the narrow gap in the netting in pursuit of the fox, rolling so he'd come down shoulder first, bracing himself for the impact. And bounced. As did the fox – high into the air. It hit the netting, made an outraged, high pitched yapping noise, then slithered down the netting. Faramir tried to get to his feet, but the base of the coop gave, and sprung beneath him, and he landed, arse first on the ground. Then bounced back into the air. The fox was catapulted into the netting a second time. He lunged for it, but only succeeded in losing his balance once more, while the fox bounced into the air yet again.

Behind him, he could hear guffaws, male and female. Once more, he tried to stand, then fell, this time landing on hands and knees facing back towards the house. In the doorway, he could see brother and sister, arms round each other's necks, tears of laughter running down their faces.

The fox leapt onto his back, sprang off it through the narrow opening in the netting, then streaked out of the garden like a flaming bolt of lightning as if the hordes of Barad-dûr were at its heels.

Éowyn let go of Éomer, grabbed the door frame, then slid down to hunker on the floor, gasping for breath.

"Faramir, you daft fucker, what the hell were you trying to do?" Éomer asked.

"Catch the fox before it got to the chickens," Faramir replied, gesturing at the garden shed.

"We don't have any chickens..."

"But the eggs we had for breakfast..."

"Came from the supermarket, you fucking idiot."

Éowyn wiped the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand, then wiped her nose on the sleeve of her hoodie. "God, that's the funniest thing I've seen in… I don't know how long. That poor bloody fox. All it wanted was to have a good root around in the dustbins, and instead some nutter comes at it with a knife."

~o~O~o~

"I suppose with you being a Medieval archer and all that, you'll thinking cooking is women's work..." Éowyn's voice came out a bit more tartly than she'd expected, or intended. She looked at Faramir to see how he'd react. He looked at her, those dark eyebrows raised in slight surprise, or perhaps simply by way of a question.

"I am a soldier of sorts too… Do you not think me capable of cooking my rations or mending my clothes when on campaign?"

"Good," Éowyn replied, feeling slightly embarrassed. "You can scrape the carrots and prep the sprouts. I'll do leeks and cauliflower. The spuds we'll do tomorrow. Doesn't do to leave them in water overnight. We'll set the table too. But Jane likes as much stuff sorted as we can on Christmas Eve, so it's all ready to go tomorrow."

Faramir drew the chopping board and a knife to him, and set to. Éowyn noticed with amusement that he was indeed quite good at the task, neat and fast. She started slicing the leeks and laying them in layers in the gratin dish.

"So, Jane says you are a healer of the sick. She showed me your picture," he said, conversationally. He gestured with the point of his knife towards her picture on the wall.

Éowyn smiled. "That's one way of putting it. Army medic, yes."

"Then I bless you from the bottom of my heart, for I have on occasion needed similar ministrations myself." He shoved up the arm of his – Éomer's – dark blue jumper to reveal a long, slightly ragged scar glistening white against the tanned skin and fine dark hairs.

"Sheesh, that's a nasty one. But your medic's quite handy with a needle – it's a neat job." She looked more closely and said "Bowie knife?"

"I know not this type."

"Combat knife. The scar's a bit of a mess."

"Sword. I was lucky though. It skidded off my vambrace, but most of the force had been taken out of the thrust – just as well, it didn't go too deeply into the muscle, nor sever any sinews."

Éowyn looked across the counter at Faramir, mind whirling. She knew he had to be talking nonsense. No one fought with real swords any more. Fencing, yes, in protective clothes, but for real… no way. But at the same time everything he said was delivered with such an air of sincerity, such a look of truth in those dark grey eyes, that she found herself carried away by the narrative. She wanted to believe him, but this idea that he was from another world was just patently absurd. Maybe the look of truth was simply because he believed it himself, utterly and without question. Which she supposed made him both a nicer person and a madder one than the alternative, that he was playing some sort of elaborate prank or con job.

Maybe with a bit of nudging he'd give himself away. Or realise what he was saying made no sense.

"So, how did it happen?"

"Mablung – he's our sergeant – and I were on patrol in the woods. We spotted a Haradrim scout. Damn near missed him, he was bloody good, even by our standards, but he disturbed a bird, and I saw the movement. Tried to take him out with my bow, but he managed to get under cover in time, so we set off after him. I'm faster than Mab, so I was just about on him when we both broke cover into a clearing where there were a couple of his comrades. He fancied the odds and turned to fight, and the other two started to run up the hill towards us. Thank the Valar, Mab got to the edge of the clearing in time to put an arrow in one of them, but then I found myself fighting off the remaining two. Mab couldn't get a clear line of sight without risking hitting me, so he came – well I would say 'running' – but it was more of a wheezing trot by that stage. I'd got one of them in the guts – bloke was careless with his guard – but the other came at me and managed to get under my guard and slice my arm. I'd have been stuffed if I'd been on my own, but Mablung finally got an arrow in him."

"Sergeants where I come from are bloody fit," said Éowyn.

"I'm a good ten years younger than him," Faramir retorted. "Though I did put him on extra training when we got back..."

"You put him on…" Éowyn's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "You're a bloody Rupert! I should have known from the way you talk. Radio 3. It all makes sense now. Only Ruperts listen to Radio 3."

"Rupert?" asked Faramir, those black brows of his drawing together quizzically.

"An officer."

"Guilty as charged… I take it you're not." The corner of his mouth quirked. "Is this the end of a beautiful friendship?"

"Depends," Éowyn replied. She tried to ignore the odd flash of… something… at the _beautiful friendship_ quip. "What are the rules on fraternizing with other ranks in your outfit?"

"Probably less tight than in yours – seeing as you include members of the fairer sex." Faramir glanced at her briefly, then looked away, too soon to see Éowyn flush faintly. He continued rather hastily, "I try to tread the line between having the odd tankard of beer with my men, but making sure no boundaries get overstepped. They have to know I'm in charge, in control – nothing makes a melee go to shit faster than a breakdown of military discipline, and that's the officer's cock-up, not the men's."

Éowyn put her knife down, and cupped her chin in her hands thoughtfully. "You know, I'd never really thought about it from the Rupert's point of view before. I suppose it must be quite a difficult balancing act. You don't want to be some cold, by-the-book bastard, but you don't want them taking liberties either."

Faramir gave a smile in return, and Éowyn felt another flash… This really wouldn't do. She knew nothing about him. He was delusional and thought he had sword fights and archery contests with imaginary enemy armies in fantasy woodlands. And yet, and yet…

"What would you say your closest call has been?" he asked her.

And for the first time since it happened, she found herself finally opening up about the IED on the road outside Basra, the truck in front blown off the road. Éowyn had grabbed her medical kit, crawled through the dirt trying to find cover. The driver and passenger had been dead when she got there, pretty much strawberry jam over the inside of the windscreen. Not a sight she wanted to see again in a hurry. The guy in the back had lost a leg, a vast pool of dark red spreading beneath him across the burning desert sand. She'd just got the tourniquet tight when a sniper's rounds rang out. Next thing she'd known, a hot pain had lanced through her shoulder.

"I was dead lucky – high velocity round, not a soft point, in and out without hitting bone or blood vessels." She pulled her jumper off her shoulder to show a puckered white scar. She didn't realise it, but now it was Faramir's turn to be hit by a wave of confusion. The weirdest mixture of emotions – compassion for her wounds, even though long healed, a gut clenching feeling that a mere handspan, and the outcome could have been so different. But coupled with… a realisation that she had a sublimely beautiful neck and shoulder. And skin so smooth he was sure it would feel like warm silk beneath his fingers. Which was not at all the sort of realisation he was used to having, comparing war wounds with a fellow soldier. He took another sprout from the bag, and started to remove its outer leaves, by way of a distraction.

Éowyn seemed to sense that a change of mood was needed. "That's enough near misses. Daftest thing that's ever happened to you? Well, other than chasing a fox into a kids' trampoline. That would take some beating."

Faramir raised his hand to his breast and bowed his head slightly in mock salute, a hint of a smile playing on his lips. "Glad to have provided some entertainment." Then he thought for a moment. "Probably the time a couple of the younger Rangers tried to smuggle a bear cub into the refuge. They had some idiotic idea that they could train it up and then sell it as a dancing bear next time they got back to the White City on leave. They thought they could make an improvised cage in one of the store-rooms with ash branches lashed together. The silly fools didn't realise that bears can gnaw their way through just about anything – ash branches, sack-cloth, a se'en-nights worth of oats, flour, salt pork and root vegetables. They rather regretted it though."

"What did you do?"

"Well, in that sort of situation, you can always trust your second in command and sergeant to make the punishment fit the crime. Though I may have dropped a hint or two about giving them free rein to be inventive. Obviously they got a month's shit-shovelling duties – that's Damrod's, the lieutenant's, starting point. But Mablung really put the icing on the cake. Next time they were in the City, he took them..." Here, Faramir flushed slightly. "Maybe I shouldn't say this to a lady..."

Éowyn grinned. "I'm no lady."

"I beg to differ," said Faramir, bowing his head to her slightly. "Anyway, he took them to a house of ill-repute in the seventh circle."

"That doesn't sound much of a punishment."

"Not as customers. As students. He said since they were so keen on getting bears to dance, it was time they got a dancing lesson – proper Haradrim belly dancing. Then made them give a performance – all decked out in silks and gauzes – when they got back to the refuge."

Éowyn snorted with laughter. "I don't think I can top that. But I did once send a new recruit to the stores for a long stand. The quartermaster told him to wait in the corner while he got it ready. It was an hour and a half before he realised he'd been had." Éowyn glanced up at the clock on the wall. "Hey, nearly three. I know something you'll really like, specially with your Rupert Radio 3 fetish. Carols from Kings."

She switched the radio on, to make sure they didn't miss the start. It did mean, however, that she had to listen to the end of the previous programme as well. This turned out to be a documentary on English Elizabethan and post-Elizabethan polyphony. _Kill me now_, thought Éowyn, but Faramir rapidly became quite engrossed in it. She rolled her eyes and turned to the cauliflower, chopping it into neat florets. Then a snippet of the discussion actually registered with her.

_Of course, several of the Mass settings we're discussing use the same theme, a popular song of the day, the Western Wind. _The announcer's voice was replaced by a man's voice, singing a hauntingly simple melody.

_Oh Western Wind, when wilt thou blow?/ The small rain down can rain./ Christ that my love were in my arms/ And I in my bed again._

Éowyn gave a snort of surprise, and Faramir's head snapped up. He gave her a curious look.

"That's… uh… a bit racy for 500 years ago, isn't it?"

Faramir started to laugh.

"What's so funny?"

"You've reminded me of something my uncle said to my cousins: _Why does every generation behave as if they are the first to discover the act of begetting? Do they never stop to ask themselves how their ancestors got to be ancestors?"_

Éowyn gave a giggle, but at the same time could feel her cheeks burning. _Act of begetting…_ Had Faramir really just said that? And how come a 500 year old song suddenly sounded like the sexiest song in the world?

~o~O~o~

_AN: Sian asked for the scene where our brave knight chases a skunk round the garden. We don't have skunks in Berkshire, so I improvised (hopes Faramir would look suitably kindly on my inventiveness)._


	6. Chapter 6

Éowyn had been spared further embarrassment by the return of the rest of the family, bearing the Christmas Tree. She had sat curled up on the couch, nursing a cup of tea, while Faramir sat cross-legged on the carpet, passing tinsel and coloured baubles to the children as they requested them. He seemed absolutely entranced by the whole thing, especially when the moment came to switch on the lights, and somehow, seeing it through his eyes, Éowyn found herself seeing it anew.

They'd eaten pizza – the family tradition for Christmas Eve, nice and easy – Jane had read the kids their bedtime story. Now the adults settled down in the sitting room to watch TV. Faramir was at first puzzled, then quite gleeful, over this magic box which showed plays and all manner of mummeries within its confines.

"You won't be in a moment," said Éomer, grimly.

"Why?"

"Back in a mo, I'll explain." He got up – Faramir was struck again by the sheer size of the man – and went through to the kitchen, returning with a container full of bottles and three glasses.

"Ready for the drinking game, Wyn? You're joining in too, Faramir. Jane likes to watch _Love Actually _ever bloody Christmas Eve..."

"And why not, you cheeky young sod? It's a lovely film," Jane bridled in pretend indignation.

"And the only way any sane person can get through it is to turn it into a drinking game. Small glasses, beer so not too strong – because we're going to be drinking a lot of it. Every time you see a Christmas jumper, or someone says 'bloody' or 'bugger', or anyone snogs..."

"Kisses," explained Éowyn, seeing Faramir's puzzled expression.

"Or the really annoying kid plays the drums, or anyone strips down to their undies..."

"Or less – don't forget Martin Freeman."

"I only wish I could, sister dearest..." Éomer winced. "Anyway, any of those, you drink the glass. Then it gets refilled."

They settled down in front of the TV. The couch – sofa, as the family called it – was large and soft. Theo settled at one end, then Jane curled up, pulling his arm round her shoulders. Éowyn settled next to her, then, to Faramir's delight, patted the empty space beside her. Éomer settled down in the armchair next to them and placed the bottles and glasses on the coffee table.

An hour or so later, Éomer looked at the scene with a mixture of brotherly indulgence and disgust. Much beer had been drunk. Jane had lasted the others out and was still watching the tail end of the film. Theo was snoozing, and Faramir had fallen really quite soundly asleep – as had Éowyn, her head now lolling on the dark stranger's shoulder. Looked at objectively, the two of them looked quite adorable, however, given that was his sister, he found it slightly nauseating. But…

Every challenge opens up an opportunity. He remembered some bloody officer or other saying that (probably at some inopportune moment when Éomer was waist deep in muddy water on an assault course – officers, specially the posh public school ones, tended to be annoying that way). Anyway, be that as it may, this definitely offered an opportunity. He got out of the armchair and stepped, surprisingly quietly for such a big man, to the fireplace. He pulled a piece of mistletoe out of the Christmas wreath which hung above the mantelpiece, then returned and balanced it on Éowyn's head. Then retreated rapidly to his armchair.

The slight movement was enough to wake Éowyn. She stirred slightly, then coloured bright red as she realised that she was snuggled against Faramir. Then realised there was a foreign object on her head. She gave it a shake, and the sprig of mistletoe dropped into her lap.

Faramir in his turn woke to find whatever nice warm thing had been curled up next to him had gone. He opened his eyes, feeling slightly befuddled by the beer, then looked round as the sound of voices and yelps hit him.

"You bastard, Éomer." Éowyn was sitting on top of her brother, pummelling him as hard as she could. He was alternately yelping as the blows made contact and guffawing. Eventually he managed to grab her wrists and hold her off.

"You've got to admit it was funny."

"What was?" Faramir asked.

"Nothing," Éowyn answered rapidly, turning bright red. "Oh look, the annoying boy's playing the drums again… Have some more beer."

~o~O~o~

As Jane loaded the dishwasher, Theo passing her mugs and plates, she suddenly said, "That strange young man Wyn brought home..."

"What about him," Theo responded.

"She's falling for him."

"Mmm, yes, I think you could be right. And he's falling for her."

"But it's a bloody mess. The guy doesn't even know who he is, can't remember a damn thing about himself beyond his first name. Doesn't know where he's come from, doesn't know what he does for a living… Typical Wyn. She's never been good at picking them."

"He seems a nice enough bloke though."

"Is that all you can say? For heaven's sakes Theo – where do the pair of them go from here?"

"I don't know, love, I don't know. But I do know she's old enough to make her own mistakes, and all we can do is watch and give her a hug if she needs it."

They continued to pack the dishwasher in silence for some time. Then Jane said, "Earlier, with the brooch…"

Theo's head snapped up. His tone, when he spoke, had lost its earlier, casual, laissez-faire tone. "What about it?"

"Ah, that's got your attention. There's always been something about all of this you haven't told me."

"I just thought you'd think it all a bit daft. When she first held the broaches, in fact every time after that, Sue always said there was something about them. An energy, a magic if you like. 'An other-worldly magic', that was how she always described it."

"And you believed her?"

"They always just felt like bits of metal and gems to me. But she said she sensed it, and… well, her instincts, sometimes they could be uncanny. And I'll tell you something else – the young man. He felt it when he held them. I could tell from his face."

"Gerroff – you're never saying you believe all his nonsense about coming from another world." Jane snorted derisively.

"Of course not. No. But there's something, something strange."

~o~O~o~

Later still, and distinctly the worse for wear, Faramir stumbled into bed. Éomer went out like a light, lying flat on his back, snoring like a growling guard dog.

Faramir, on the other hand, lay with his thoughts whirling. As tended to happen on the rare occasions when he got a bit drunk, ale seemed to take the brakes off his thought processes, allow them to go places he wouldn't normally, or would see the danger of well in advance. And tonight, the place they went to, of course, was beautiful, beautiful Wyn. And the line of thought that the film had started. Not to mention her delightful proximity to him.

It seemed that this world was considerably looser in its morals than the world from which he had come. People it seemed, thought nothing of hopping from bed to bed (though infidelity still seemed to be just as frowned on, and caused just as much pain). But there seemed to be no expectation that a woman come to her marriage bed still a maid. Which left a puzzle, one which he was sure a gentleman wouldn't allow himself to think about… but then, he was drunk. Was Wyn a maid? And did it matter to him?

Just for an instant, he felt a gut clenching stab of jealousy. Then reflected that probably, were he to make her his, the jealousy would evaporate, to be left only with feelings of pity towards the poor benighted fool who had once had her, and let her slip through his fingers. And then he had one of those lightning bolt flashes of genius (or what passes for genius when one is several sheets to the wind): the thing that truly mattered was not being a woman's first lover, but loving her well enough that she would choose you to be her last lover.

How, he mused (as a beer sodden sleep finally claimed him), could he persuade Éowyn that he was worthy of this? Especially since he was pretty damned sure she thought he was mad as a March hare.

~o~O~o~

_Just a quick note to say thank you to the reviews from people not logged in, which obviously I can't respond to individually (and thanks of course for all the reviews). And if reading this is a guilty pleasure, I can assure you, so too is writing it. :-D_


	7. Chapter 7

Another morning, another small foot in the guts. This time the small girl stopped on his bed and he felt something made from soft fabric hit him in the face. Trying not to wince (his head could have been better) he opened his eyes.

A large red boot was being swung in front of his eyes.

"Santa's been, Santa's been. And he even knew to bring you a stocking."

Faramir took the proffered garment, thinking _this will never fit, and there's only one of it…_ Then he realised that it was quite heavy and filled with small lumpy items.

"Go on, see what's in it."

On the main bed above, Éomer sat up. "Don't I get one?"

"Of course you do. Santa knows _you_ live here." Kelly produced another, very similar looking red sock. Éomer wasted no time tipping it out onto his bed. A cascade of small packages fell out. Faramir followed suit.

"This is the best one," said Kelly, pushing a small, highly stylised golden bear towards him. He picked it up.

"You take the gold foil off and eat it," Kelly explained. She was getting quite used to their strange visitor who needed even the most everyday things explained to him. Faramir did as he was told and then cautiously nibbled an ear. Then the head. He broke off a chunk and gave it to Kelly – it seemed only fair, given that she had let him know that this wondrous item was edible. Then continued with most of the rest of the bear.

"Good, isn't it?"

"Good… the best thing I've ever tasted."

"Santa's left presents under the tree for all of us. Come downstairs." She grabbed Faramir by the hand and pulled.

"Wait… I'll just get dressed then I'll come straight down."

~o~O~o~

An hour or so later, Faramir found himself sitting on the floor watching Kelly make something elaborate with more of the brightly coloured bricks (smaller ones this time) that he'd already encountered. The toy even included two tiny figures with brightly coloured swords. Now that the children had opened all their presents, the adults were opening theirs at a rather more leisurely pace, accompanied by a dark bitter drink which Faramir wasn't entirely sure he liked, but which certainly seemed to be helping with the lingering traces of a headache from last night's ale.

"Here." Faramir looked up to see Éowyn smiling shyly at him, holding out a brightly coloured parcel. He took it, stumbling over his thanks and apologising for not getting her anything in return.

"Don't worry, you weren't to know. Open it."

He followed the example of the others and tore open the brightly coloured paper – blue with silver snowflakes falling across its surface. Inside was a garment. He shook it out. A short knitted tunic with long sleeves, similar to the ones the fishermen wore in Dol Amroth. But in a deep green.

"Somehow I thought green would suit you." Faramir nodded and took off the top Éomer had loaned him, replacing it with the green. "See, it does suit you." She smiled at him, and he felt as though he would never want to take this garment off again, if it could make her look like that.

"Wyn, I've got something for you." Éomer held out a long, thin, oblong parcel, longer than Faramir's arm. Éowyn jumped to her feet and clapped her hands with excitement.

"You haven't even opened it yet…"

"But I can guess from the shape." Almost reverently, she took it from him, and ripped the paper off, then opened the box inside. Within lay a sword. Faramir was puzzled – not a metal one, but some sort of strange white substance. It had a very slightly curved blade, and instead of a cross guard, an elaborately shaped guard which started where the cross would have been and formed a crescent shaped filigree piece to connect with the pommel. He realised to his surprise that it was admirably thought out – such a guard would protect one's knuckles and hand perfectly, as well as deflecting strokes away from the wrist and forearm.

Éowyn picked it up and quickly ran through what Faramir knew as the "Winds from all directions", the fluid set of strokes from all angles.

"No swords in the house." Jane's voice was firm, and brooked no dissent.

"Sorry, Jane! But it's only a nylon practice sword. Well, I say 'only' but it's a beauty. Thank you Éomer. It's perfect – the balance is spot on and it's weighted just right."

"Boxing Day fencing?" asked her brother.

"Of course. I'll even give you a handicap of a couple of points if you want," Éowyn replied with a cheeky grin.

Kelly had finished her model, and came over to Éomer with a book tucked under her arm.

"Thank you for the present, Éomer. Will you read me one of the stories?"

"Which one?"

"Sleeping Beauty is my favourite."

Theo laughed. "Very different from Éowyn! She hated that story when she was a kid. Always said 'But what if the princess didn't like him?' She said if some weird bloke she'd never met before tried to wake her up by kissing her, she'd punch him in the nose."

"She would have done, too," said Éomer with feeling.

"Yeah, well," Éowyn retorted, "In the unlikely event I ever get kissed by Prince Charming, I want to be fully conscious."

"On evidence to date," Éomer said, "You only seem to kiss frogs."

Éowyn reached out and flicked him on the ear. "Ouch."

Faramir listened to this exchange, thinking _Never before have I set great store by the titles which a man accrues by a mere accident of birth, but, oh, would that I could change places with one of my cousins, just for the title… Would she settle for the younger son of the Steward, though I have no title beyond lord, and none that I have earned, beyond captain?_ In his heart, he knew that Éowyn would not give a damn one way or the other – if he could persuade her to take him at all, he sensed that she would take him for the man he was, not for any title.

He took another sip of the strange bitter drink to cover his feelings of confusion. It seemed his heart was set on courting her, and this sudden realisation surprised him somewhat. When had feelings of admiration, then attraction, then desire, taken on such substantial form? And why was his heart so much at odds with what his head told him was the only rational course? For he could hardly court her, thrown into a strange world where he had no standing, no status, no home, no occupation, nothing.

Odd details of his previous life came to him, but he still did not know why he was here. He had a sense that it was important. He also had a vague feeling that he had not landed up here, with this particular family, at random. Something to do with a swordsman kept popping into his head, but he wasn't sure exactly what. Anyway, Éowyn wasn't a swordsman – she was, well, what word would he use? Swordswoman? The only word which really seemed appropriate was shieldmaiden.

He would have to content himself with admiring his beautiful, wondrous shieldmaiden from afar.

~o~O~o~

True to his word the day before, Faramir peeled a great many potatoes. He watched as Jane put a large bird in the oven, and started to cook many delicious things to accompany it. Éowyn shepherded the children into the dining room to help her lay the table – once his potato peeling duties were done, he sneaked a look.

The table was a marvel – a bright red cloth of a silken material, glittering knives and forks, sparkling glasses of a fine quality he had not seen rivalled even on his uncle's table, the centre laid with some of the glittering gold "fluff" (for want of a better word) the children had added to the tree.

The meal was wonderful. The table creaked with enough food for an army – golden potatoes, carrots glistening with butter, roasted vegetables, peas (oh the wonders of this world, which could deliver peas in midwinter, encased in ice rather than dried, which tasted as good as if they had just been picked on a summer's day). Sausages wrapped in bacon – _pigs in blankets_, the children informed him. Rich gravy, delicious sauces. And wine. Not quite Tolfalas, but certainly passable, no, better than passable.

Then there were the strange tubes, with twists of paper, brightly coloured and covered in glitter. Again, the children explained – you grasped an end each and pulled. They came apart with a loud bang – louder even than a champagne cork. Then various brightly coloured but flimsy toys cascaded out, and a paper hat. Faramir was far from convinced by the paper hat, but everyone seemed to be wearing theirs, so he put up with the slightly ridiculous headgear.

Then a wondrous flaming pudding, a couple of holly leaves gracing the top of it. Rich with fruits and nuts and spices and brandy, and covered in a delicious sweet sauce, egg-yellow and piping hot.

After the meal, they went to the sitting room once more.

"Queen's Speech," said Jane, firmly, and Theo groaned. The children set to, laying lengths of wooden strips with grooves cut in them, along which wagons could trundle. Kelly seemed intent on constructing an elaborate knotwork pattern with the wooden strips, to rival the intricate knotwork on Éowyn's brooch. Callum seemed equally intent on dismantling it as fast as she made it, and eventually Éomer had to get down on the floor to act as referee.

Faramir took up the same position as he had the night before, sitting next to Éowyn, while Jane turned on the TV. Faramir marvelled at the age of their queen, tiny, white-haired, face deeply lined, yet eyes still sparkling. He tried to pay attention, but her clipped accent, the unfamiliar dialect of Westron, and the pudding with its wondrous yellow sauce, soon put paid to that. He nodded off once more.

~o~O~o~

Éowyn woke to realise she was delighfully warm and comfortable, cushioned against a firm pillow that seemed to have moulded itself to her body. Then she realised what, or rather, who the pillow was, and sat up, cheeks flaming. The pillow yawned and stretched.

"Sorry," she said. "I hope I didn't drool on you."

Faramir laughed.

Theoden and Jane were nowhere to be seen, and Éomer was still constructing railway with Callum, studiously ignoring his sister with the air of a man who had decided that there were some things he simply did not want to know about. Kelly was sitting with her book of fairy tales. She looked up.

"Good. You're awake. Faramir, I want to play schools. I'm the teacher and you're going to be the class."

Faramir looked slightly startled, but dutifully got down on the floor.

"Cross-legged. That's how you have to sit for carpet time." Kelly came and sat next to him, and opened the animal alphabet book that had once been hers, and was now Callum's. "You have to learn the letters for all the sounds. _Ah_ is for ant. _Buh _is for bee. _Kuh _is for cat..." And so she went on, tracing the letters.

Éowyn watched with interest and more than a hint of concern. Jane had mentioned the man couldn't read, and that he'd seemed really distressed by this. She knew from her time in the army that though recruits were meant to come in with a minimal set of qualifications, some of them had only scraped minimum passes and really struggled. And those who were illiterate, usually through no fault of their own, tended to be absolutely mortified about this fact. She felt a knot of worry in her stomach; she liked this man, liked him a great deal (liked him more than she should and certainly more than she was prepared to admit). She really didn't want to see him humiliated. Maybe she should go to help Jane and Theo, to spare him embarrassment.

Too late. "Wyn… you have to come and do carpet time too. Pretend you can't read either. _Puh _is for pig..."

Some half an hour or more later, at least three things became apparent. One was that Faramir genuinely couldn't read. The second was that he was starting to learn – with absolutely startling rapidity. And the third was that he wasn't just quick-witted, in a street smarts sort of way (which she'd already guessed) but that he was very, very bright indeed.

She guessed he must come from a country with an alphabet, because clearly the general idea of what Kelly was trying to explain was familiar. Greek? Russian? Arabic? He didn't _look_ like he was from any of these countries, but then again, Éowyn had seen enough of the world to have found out from experience that crude caricatures were rarely accurate. Then again, Faramir's English, though quaintly old-fashioned, was nearly accentless.

He had a fearsomely good memory. By now he seemed to have memorised the whole alphabet, so Kelly sent Éowyn ("you're class monitor for the week") to fetch a "proper book." Éowyn returned with _Fox in Socks. _Faramir's eyes narrowed, and he gave her a sidelong look of pretend annoyance, shaking his head slightly, so she stuck her tongue out at him.

But before long, he was slowly sounding out the beginning pages, much to Kelly's approval. She'd decided her star pupil was clearly a credit to her miraculous teaching abilities. What was even nicer, Éowyn thought, was the look of sheer delight on Faramir's face. He sat bowed over the book, strands of his black hair escaping from the pony tail he'd tied it into earlier when he set to work in the kitchen. Éowyn looked at them and got an almost irresistible urge to reach out and brush the dark hair away from his cheek.

He looked up and just for a moment Éowyn felt almost as though an electric spark had passed between them. She felt herself blush again (she swore she'd blushed more in the last two days than the previous ten years), and saw the hint of a smile form on Faramir's face.

"Pay attention," Kelly admonished him. Faramir grinned broadly, and Éowyn felt as though she'd just been gifted the best Christmas present of all.

~o~O~o~

_AN – The fencing exercise Éowyn works through is a "Moulinette" - the basic exercise with a military sabre._

_If you haven't read it, Sian's Animalia is a wonderful story about alphabetical bestiaries and fatherhood._


	8. Chapter 8

Éowyn woke early on Boxing Day. _Enough of this rich food and indolence! _She knew that there would be hell to pay if she went back to her unit and couldn't keep up with the blokes in PT. Reluctantly, she hauled her arse out of bed (the air mattress on the sitting room floor), pulled her kitbag out off the cupboard and found a t-shirt, leggings and a sports bra. Air mattress deflated and stowed in the cupboard for the day (always a good idea to keep on Jane's good side), she let herself out the front door and set off for the river. The path along the river bank was ideal – 6 K up to the ring-road and back, keeping up a seven-and-a-half minute-mile pace all the way. Well, maybe easing up a little in the last couple of K.

Tomorrow, she thought, she'd maybe drag Éomer down to the park, and they could set up a beep test. She hated it, he hated it, but competitiveness always got them through. Maybe she could ask Faramir to join in… Then she cursed herself. She'd made a promise to herself last night that she was going to stop thinking about him the whole bloody time – which was another reason she'd gone for this run.

When she got back, she stretched out carefully in the hall before heading into the kitchen. She grabbed a glass of orange juice and a banana and stood at the counter eating it, then went and showered. As the hot water cascaded over her, she reflected that she hadn't heard the kids rocketing around. Maybe Jane had taken them out. _Jeans… need jeans… _was her next thought, so she went to the bedroom, remembering just in time to knock. No answer – looked like both blokes were up and about already, so she went in to root around in the chest of drawers and find some clean clothes to wear. The room looked like a bomb site. Éomer had actually bothered to pull his duvet back into place (military discipline will do that for a man), but the trundle bed was a disaster area. The pillow all askew, the duvet in a heap, a crumpled t-shirt half hanging off the edge. _What a mess… remember this, Éowyn, every time you think about getting soppy. The man's a slob. _For some reason, this thought didn't help as much as she might have hoped.

Finally clean and clothed, she made her way back down stairs and into the sitting room. The reason for the quiet kids became apparent – they sat, one either side of Faramir, snuggled up against him, watching _Shrek._ Faramir was wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, his shoulders shaking. At the sound of the door, he turned his head.

"The bluebird… Her singing made the bluebird explode..." He continued to chuckle as the children shushed him.

Éowyn sat down in the armchair. The film unfolded. Having seen it more times than she could count, she actually gained more amusement from watching Faramir watch it than from the film itself. She also couldn't help but notice how comfortable the children seemed with him.

_Shit. Not thinking about that. Not thinking about that. Definitely not thinking about that._

"Ah, this is where you all are!" Éomer appeared, filling the doorway. "You promised me a sword fight!"

"At the end of Shrek," said Éowyn. "It's nearly finished."

~o~O~o~

"Right, you know the rules," Éomer said to the children.

"We have to watch from inside the trampoline and we're not allowed out," chorused Kelly and Callum. The children kicked off their shoes and clambered into the _fox pen_, as Éowyn had nicknamed it. Éomer and Éowyn went over to the chicken-coop-that-didn't-hold-chickens, and unlocked it. Faramir caught sight of his own bow, arrows, side-sword and knives, tucked in the corner. But that wasn't what the siblings were interested in; instead they pulled out clothes, a sword each, and helms with mesh face-masks. And a box of chalk.

On the path that ran from the back of the house to the back gate, Éowyn chalked out a series of lines. Once she'd finished, she and Éomer put on the padded jackets and gloves. Éowyn turned to the kids and said "Kelly, you get to shout 'go' for the first bout. Callum – you can do it for the second."

She placed the helm on her head, and she and Éomer took their stances, both in a low guard (both right-handers, Faramir noted) beyond the outer chalk marks on the path.

"Go!" shouted Kelly.

They were fast – lightning fast. Both lunged forward, attacking high against the other's torso. But Éowyn was undoubtedly the faster of the two. A blur of motion, she landed a hit near Éomer's collar-bone, a whisper before Éomer's blade hit her head. Faramir frowned in puzzlement.

Where was the cautious sparring, the testing of one another's guard, the circling?

"One-nil to me," crowed Éowyn, triumphantly.

They took up their guards behind the chalk lines again. Then attacked again – Éomer feinted, Éowyn parried, forced him onto the back foot, then further back, and further still, until he tripped over the step at the edge of the patio and came down hard on his arse. She switched her sword to her left hand and offered him a hand up.

"Two-nil..."

Third time – this was pretty much a repeat of the first time, only Éowyn hit Éomer in the guts as his blade skittered off her shoulder. The two were almost simultaneous.

"You were on the attack, sis, I concede the point."

Faramir felt his mouth begin to twitch into a smile. And they thought he was ridiculous for his assault on the fox? This had to be one of the more absurd spectacles he'd seen. It was impressively fast, and both undoubtedly did know how to wield a blade. Another round, another pair of hits, Éowyn's (again) slightly before her brother's. This time he couldn't help an audible snort of laughter escaping. It was all very entertaining, and he could sort of see the point – it was a stylised, stripped down sort of fighting which tested only how fast you could lunge on the attack, nothing more. But ultimately, what was the point if you would both be dead at the end of it?

Éowyn heard his laugh. "What's so funny? Do you want a go? If you think you could do better?"

"No, no, you are most skilled with a blade. But… it wouldn't help you much in a real fight, if you landed a thrust first, only to die on the end of your dying opponent's counter-thrust."

Éowyn took her helmet off and smiled at him. "You've missed the point. This is sports fencing. Yes, it's kind of limited, but the whole point is speed on the attack. We can do some historical fencing if you think you'd like that better."

"And you could try out your Christmas present," Éomer added. They went back to the shed, and came back with Éowyn's strange white practice sword. Éomer had a similar one, but more akin to the side sword Faramir carried (or rather, didn't – he could still see it tucked in the corner of the shed, in its scabbard). Though Éomer's had a more elaborate guard than the simple cross-guard of Faramir's; an elaborately wrought basket surrounded his hand. Similarly Éowyn's sabre had a guard – a simple crescent shape from above the hand to the end of the pommel – which protected her knuckles. _An interesting idea_, Faramir thought, and made a note that if he ever got home, he must ask his armourer if he could create a similar hand-guard.

This time, they took their places on the lawn. They took up slightly different stances, Éomer with his hand in what Faramir thought of as "first guard", hand level with his ribs, blade extended upwards towards Éowyn's head. Éowyn, he noted, favoured a high guard, hand level with her face, blade extended downwards.

They began to circle, and this time were much more careful, testing, parrying, feeling out each other's preferred strokes. Then Éowyn committed, lunged forward, again at lightning speed. Another double hit, but again, Éomer conceded Éowyn had been faster. As the fight unfolded, the slightly different rules evened up the contest a bit – with his greater reach, Éomer landed more first hits.

But Faramir found himself fascinated by Éowyn's grace and speed, and the considerable strength she hid in that slender frame. He found himself remembering his swordmaster's words back when he was twelve. _The whole point about weapons is they are a leveller – six inches of steel in the guts takes down the stronger, taller man just as efficiently as it does the smaller, lighter man. You need a good defence above all, then speed and precision and technique. _Mind you, he wondered what effect the rather delightful way her golden braid of hair swung across her back as she lunged and parried would have on him were he to join in, not to mention her muscled, shapely thighs and slender waist. He suspected he would struggle to maintain his focus.

It turned out he didn't have long to wait. Éomer took his helm off and ruffled his dark blond hair, then said, "C'mon then, let's see your stage-fighting skills, or LARP-ing skills, or whatever they are," and held out the helm to Faramir.

"LARP-ing?" asked Faramir, puzzled once more. But he took the proffered helm and padded jacket, pulled on the gloves and took Éomer's strange white sword, testing it out.

The balance was right… so was the weight. He quickly worked his way through the _winds_, the figure of 8 motion that took the swordsman through all the cutting strokes, then tried a few lunges and thrusts. Éowyn had taken her helm off and he noticed how her eyebrows rise in faint surprise as she watched him. Good.

He'd noted a few things about her style. Perhaps the main point was that she didn't go for the legs much – and by the same token, tended to leave her own unguarded. With this in mind, he adopted the middle stance favoured by Éomer, hand just above waist level, elbow tucked in, sword point towards Éowyn's face – or rather, the mesh guard on the front of her helm. She adopted her favoured high guard. This, Faramir knew, should enable her to guard her legs – if she expected such a stroke. But he was pretty sure she wouldn't.

They circled. Faramir was a more cautious, considered opponent than Éomer. Much more cautious. Hardly surprising, had the siblings known his background – usually these days when he drew his sword, he fought in the knowledge that any mistake was likely to be his last.

"Come on, stop pussy-footing around," Éowyn said, with a laugh. She started to taunt him good naturedly. "Didn't your panto audiences want any action? You can't just spend all your time on the defensive. That'll look really rubbish." Her voice dropped to a growl. "C'mon, surely you want a piece of me?"

Faramir's breath caught for a moment. He certainly did want a piece of her, he thought, though probably not in the way she was meaning. His momentary inattention allowed her to dart forward and land a thrust firmly in his gut. He had been right. She did hit hard. Bloody hard.

"One-nil to me," she said, crowing.

They circled again. She came forward. Faramir almost didn't manage the parry, she was so quick. But he'd known when she came, she'd come fast and furious, and try to dart back almost as quickly. He followed his parry with a downward slice, rapping her across the thigh.

"Hey, that's below the belt," she complained.

"Real combat," Faramir replied. "I'd need to slow you down. That leg wound would do the trick nicely." Then, a touch more belligerently, "I'm having the point."

"Ha, Wyn, not quite the mild-mannered man you thought he was," Éomer laughed.

Éowyn circled him, blade held high. There was a coiled intensity to her stance – he'd riled her. This, too, was good.

She darted forward. This time, their blades locked near the hilts – or would have done had they been metal. Faramir seized the moment to grasp Éowyn's blade and slice her side.

"Hey, what is this? Sword fighting or gutter fighting." She sounded almost outraged by the effrontery.

"As I said… Whatever works. Whatever keeps me alive. Gutter fighting is good. Two-one… to me."

"If that's how you want it..." Éowyn launched in without warning, a dazzling array of cuts coming in from all directions, faster than a hawk could stoop. It took all of Faramir's defensive skill to ward them off. Then, to his amazement, she switched her sword to her left hand and feinted at his undefended side, and as he parried, off balance, she kicked his legs out from under him. The next thing he knew, he was staring up at the clouds, winded, with Éowyn's sword point at his throat.

"Gutter enough for you?" she said, a dangerous note in her voice. She pulled off her helm. Her blue-grey eyes were sparkling, her cheeks flushed with effort and maybe, just maybe, Faramir thought, hoped, something else. Or maybe it was just his mind playing tricks after the air had been knocked out of his lungs.

"Was that one of your Krav Maga moves?" Éomer asked, his voice filled with approval. "Martial arts cross-over, I like it."

Faramir pulled his helmet off too, the better to take a deep breath. Éowyn stepped back and held out her hand, pulling Faramir to his feet. He held onto her hand a few heart beats longer than was necessary. Then out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kelly bouncing up and down on the trampoline.

"A true knight would kiss the lady's hand," she squeaked in excitement.

Faramir grinned at her, then fixed his gaze back on Éowyn. He lifted her hand to his lips, then, at the last moment, turned it over and pressed the lightest of kisses to her palm, before reluctantly releasing it. All the time he watched her. Not his mind playing tricks – she was definitely flushed. He smiled, a smile for Éowyn alone, as he raised his hand to his breast and bowed.

"I have been vanquished by a truly worthy opponent. I yield, my lady."

Éowyn raised her sword in a return salute. Behind the blade, he could see her eyes glittering.

Then the children came scambling out of the trampoline, and the moment was gone. "Our turn, our turn..."

Éomer went to the shed and retrieved a pair of thick tubes – the thickness of stout branches. One red, the other blue. Seeing Faramir's look of surprise, he held the blue one out. Faramir took it in his sword-hand. There was a wooden stick down the centre of some sort of strange, very light material which, as he tested it against the palm of his other hand, gave very slightly. The outside was soft, the inside strong, with a simple cross guard above the hilt. Suddenly he felt a blow over his head – but it didn't hurt at all.

Éowyn stood, red "sword" in hand, with a wicked grin on her face. "They can't hurt themselves with these. Just as well, because they'll leather hell out of each other."

"That's siblings for you," said Éomer, with a laugh.

"Aye, it is indeed," Faramir agreed, with some feeling.

~o~O~o~

_AN – a chance comparison of a couple of YouTube videos, one on modern Olympic Sabre, the other on sabre within Historical European Martial Arts, sparked the idea that Faramir, used to the notion that getting hit by a sword would kill you, would find sports fencing very funny (skilful, yes, awesomely fast, yes, but ultimately so divorced from the real thing as to seem a bit absurd)._

_Thanks again for the reviews. Earthdragon - no lightsabres, I'm afraid. Eowyn's sabre is a nylon replica of a late 18th century sabre - the ones I have in mind are made by Black Fencer, and have the reputation of being weighted and balanced just like the real thing, and are used for HEMA fighting (Historical European Martial Arts)._


	9. Chapter 9

Lunch was turkey curry. Faramir had never encountered anything quite that spicy – even the evil garlic sausage young Anborn used to bring back from leave in Lebennin didn't have that much of a kick. But it was nice when you got used to it – and even nicer when he added in a couple of spoonfuls of the children's much milder version while no-one was looking, and a good dollop of yoghurt.

After lunch Jane's phone buzzed, and she quickly checked to see the message. (_Palantirs, _Faramir found himself thinking once more.)

"Oh great, Izzy from number 20 says she can come and babysit. Says after two days of her parents, she's looking forward to a break." Jane laughed. "That'll be ours in seven or eight years' time."

"_It's just soooo unfair,_" Theo answered, in a quite passable imitation of Kevin the Teenager. "Mind you, I've already been through it all once… in fact, given the way they were belting hell out of each other earlier, I'm not sure I'm out of it yet."

"Faramir came off worst," said Éowyn.

"Only 'cos he made the mistake of pissing you off," Éomer retorted.

"So – pub tonight," Jane interrupted. "And Wyn, try to find something that's not jeans and a sweatshirt fraying round the cuffs."

Faramir volunteered to help Jane tidy up (he was acutely aware of her generosity in looking after him). Éomer offered too. Kelly (who had decided two big brother figures were better than one) came to supervise, and perched on a chair, chattering enthusiastically.

"Éomer's horse is called Maldon. Did you know all the horses are called after battles or places, so Maldon must be extra special because he's called after both?"

Éomer's face broke into a broad grin. "He's a good boy, is Maldon. Well behaved, but plenty of spirit with it."

"And Maldon lives really, really high up. All the way up near the top of a tower block. He has to go up and down in a special lift for horses."

Faramir shot Éomer a look of complete bafflement. Éomer laughed, and pulled out his phone. "Here," he said, and passed the phone over. Faramir took it as though it might bite (again, that part of his mind which still whispered _Palantir_). True to his suspicions, the phone showed an image – of a high tower which dwarfed the trees around its base, majestic chestnuts and oaks and limes though they were. The tower stood proud against a bright blue sky. So sharp was the contrast, one might almost have imagined being able to reach from one of the upper windows and place a hand on the high vault of the firmament itself.

"Hyde Park Barracks," Éomer explained. "There really is a lift inside for the horses, and some of the stables are near the top."

Faramir stood stock still. There was a roaring sound in his ears, and he felt as though the world had tilted around him. He whispered in a voice almost too low to be heard, "Seek for the swordsman who is no man, and the knight whose horse is stabled in the sky."

Éomer and Jane both stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at him, Jane turning chalk white.

Faramir gave his head a shake, then looked around. He saw his companions looking at him with shocked faces. "I…" He didn't quite know where to start. These people already thought him mad, and now he had added to that impression. And he realised, thrown out of kilter by the fragmentary memory, that he was not entirely sure himself that he was sane. But yet, but yet.

"They are what I remember someone saying to me before I was cast into this world. I was to seek for these people… And it seems as though you have been here all along, both of you."

He could see Jane, pressing her hands on the kitchen counter for support, knuckles white, looking even more distressed.

"I know you think I am mad, moon-struck. I would think the same were I you. But all I can tell you is the truth as I know it – that someone said these words to me, entrusted me with a sacred mission to find the swordsman and the knight. And it seems I have found them, though I know not what I am meant to do."

Suddenly, a wave of tiredness washed over him. He sat down heavily on one of the kitchen chairs and rubbed the backs of his hands against his eyes.

Jane's shoulder's sagged. She was searching round desperately for a sane explanation. Eventually, she came up with the best one she could. "Tomorrow I'm taking you to the doctor. I think this might be the after effects of the bang on the head. It's your brain trying to fill in the gaps it doesn't remember, and just latching onto things you've come across in the last few days, weaving them into a story at random."

Faramir was too tired to argue the point. "Perhaps you are right, Mistress Jane. Maybe I should go and rest for an hour or so. I am sorry if my words have caused you distress." He gave one of those strange bows, hand to his chest, then turned and left.

Éomer let out a long breath he hadn't known he was holding. "Mad as a box of frogs," he said. Then, "Christ, and I think Éowyn's falling for him."

"I'll get him to the doctor tomorrow..."

Jane was interrupted by Theo walking into the kitchen. "Get who to the doctor? Faramir?"

"Yes, he's had a bit of a funny turn. Started talking about having been sent to find a… what was it again, Éomer?"

"A swordsman who was no man, and a knight whose horse was stabled in the sky. Seems to think it was me and Éowyn." Éomer touched his finger to his temple and circled it in the time-honoured gesture.

"Faramir's not mad. He's nice." Kelly's voice suddenly piped up out of nowhere. Jane drew in a sharp breath – she'd forgotten Kelly was there, listening to everything.

"You're right, of course he's not mad. But he has had a nasty bump on the head and we're worried about him, love. Éomer…" She shot him a warning look, as if to say _help me out here._ "Didn't you want to watch that new DVD with the kids?"

Éomer grimaced as if to say _Not particularly_, but scooped Kelly up and took her through to the sitting room.

Theo sat down, unwittingly taking the chair Faramir had just vacated. "So, tell me about it."

Jane filled him in on the details. "It was quite uncanny. He really believes this stuff."

There was a long silence. Eventually, Theo spoke.

"You're going to think I'm as mad as he is. But… About a week before social services turned up in the middle of the night with a couple of traveller kids, cold and frightened out of their wits, Sue had a dream. In the dream, someone came to her – a wise man, a _dewin, _she called him. He said that her greatest desire would come to her, two children to love and look after, and bring to adulthood. But these children were only on loan. That one day, someone would come for them. Not in a bad way, mind. Just that they were destined for greatness, and he'd be there to let them know the time had come."

"You're right. You do sound as mad as him."

"There's an old trunk in the lock-up with my work stuff. The rest of the stuff the kids came with. It's in there, I think." Theo looked at his watch. "I'll go get it tomorrow. You and I can go through it, see what there is in there."

"Theo, I'm worried. About you. You're getting drawn into this whole thing and it's completely crazy."

~o~O~o~

Éomer put Kelly on the couch, then found the new DVD. Éowyn looked up from where she'd been helping Callum to build another railway.

"Where's Faramir?"

In times to come, Éomer sometimes felt a lot of trouble – and he meant a _lot_ – might have been saved if he'd been honest with Éowyn and told her just how barking mad the dark-haired man she'd insisted on bringing home was. He should have been honest. Rather than stay silent and let her fall for a nutter. Though… Perhaps some things were destined to be. Perhaps she'd still have fallen in love with him knowing he was a nutter. Either way, hindsight was a wonderful thing, but the trouble was, one didn't have it at the moment the decision had to be made. And he decided, in that moment, to stay quiet.

In any case, the truth was, he actually liked the man. And he couldn't bring himself to make Éowyn unhappy. Right now, there and then, not knowing what lay in store, all he could think was that Éowyn would work it out for herself soon enough, so he didn't need to upset her right now.

"He's gone for a lie down – bit of a headache. Says he'll be fine after a bit of a rest. Plenty good enough to go to the pub. Which is the important thing."

"Good. Farouk just called. He said we could go and check on your bike if we wanted. He wanted to know what you wanted doing with it – the quick fix or the more expensive solution."

"Well, seeing as how you're going to have to pay for it, I think the more expensive one. But okay, we'll go and see him. He happy with us going over on Boxing Day?"

"Yeah. Said he quite likes Christmas itself, excuse a bit of a party and stuffing yourself with nice food. But by Boxing Day he's getting a bit fed up with the whole palaver, and really he'd sooner be celebrating Eid. The food tastes better after all the fasting, apparently, and he's fed up with turkey."

Éomer laughed.

Ten minutes later, Faramir appeared in the doorway.

"Feeling better?" Éowyn asked.

"I am very much improved, thank you," Faramir lied. In fact he had spent the last hour or so staring at the ceiling in a state of turmoil. He now had two fragmentary memories, and knew he had found something important to his quest, but how it tied together, or how he was supposed to proceed from here, he had not the first idea.

Éowyn wasn't fooled. His face had a pinched, drawn look, and there were furrows of worry between his brows. She wondered if a distraction would help.

"I'm going out in the garden to sort out my fencing gear," she said, getting up from her place on the floor. "I've got a competition when I get back to barracks, and I want to make sure I've got the right kit with me. Do you want to show me your stuff while we're out there? I'd be interested to see it."

Faramir nodded, grateful for something to do, and stood to one side to let her lead the way.

Éowyn made short work of selecting her favourite competition blades and the protective clothing that went with them, stowing them safely in a large holdall. Then, from the back of the shed, she unearthed a folding table which she set out on the path.

"Put your stuff on here and talk me through it," she said.

Faramir placed his bow and quiver on the table. "I would imagine these will be of least interest to you – for you are a… mistress with the sword, rather than an archer. The bow is one of my favourites. For a pitched battle, I'd choose a longbow, but for work in the woods – scouting, ambushes – a longbow would be unwieldy and get caught. So this one is a bit shorter. Still quite a heavy draw weight." He paused, strung the bow, then handed it to Éowyn. She tried to pull it, but could only get it about half way. Faramir smiled. "It takes practice. I won't nock any arrows – it wouldn't be safe so close to the houses."

He put the bow and quiver back in the shed, then got out his sword in its scabbard, and two knives. Éowyn looked at the knives first, drawing them carefully from their scabbards. Cautiously, she tested an edge with her thumb.

"Good and sharp..."

"Wouldn't be much use if it wasn't."

She looked at the blade. Along the blade, just in from the cutting edge, was a sworling, wavy line of mottled grey steel, almost like marbling. She looked more closely. Along the length of the blade, parallel to it, she could make out fine lines, almost like the grain in wood, but much, much finer. Éowyn traced the irregular wave with a finger tip.

"It's beautiful."

"The wave comes from repeatedly heating and quenching the blade during forging. The grain comes from folding the metal over and over again, to make it strong and flexible."

"Like a Japanese Katana," Éowyn said. "But I've never seen this done for a dagger before."

"I know not of the Katana, but yes, we forge both daggers and swords this way. Though my sword is a very work-a-day implement. The scabbard, though, belonged to my grandfather."

Éowyn picked up the sword in its scabbard. The scabbard was an old, but supple and well-cared for leather. She turned it over. Stitched into the leather, in silver thread, was an emblem – a stylised tree, white against the dark leather. She placed her hand over it, and instantly felt something like an electric shock, a sense of connection. Startled, she pulled her hand back.

"You felt it too… as I felt it, when I held your brooch in my hand," Faramir said.

Éowyn stared at him, feeling the world tilt beneath her feet.

"I don't understand it either," Faramir said, covering her hand with his own for a moment. "But I feel it too. And – hard as it may be to believe – I am not mad." Just for a moment, he held onto her hand, stroking gentle circles on the back of it with his thumb.


	10. Chapter 10

After an early evening meal, Éowyn and Éomer set off into the centre of town to see how their respective bikes were getting on at Farouk's garage. Éomer was insistent that his was far and away the more important of the two. Which was how Faramir came to be sitting at the table in the tavern – the "pub" as his new friends called it – trying to make conversation with Jane and Theo. He listened politely as Theo told various anecdotes about his work, and Jane talked about how she and a friend were trying to set up their own cleaning company, but really his mind was entirely on Éowyn. She had said she and Éomer would arrive later, but the whole trip felt pointless without her. Then, finally, the door swung open – and Faramir's jaw just about hit the floor.

Éowyn walked in. Thanks to his cousin Lothíriel's riding antics (she had a habit of borrowing her brothers' breeches when it was just family around), he was already used to women in trousers. He had got used to the idea of women in short skirts; _other lands, other customs,_ he told himself. But nothing could have got him used to this.

Éowyn's hair flowed like a golden waterfall about her shoulders. She wore a plain black top with a high neck and long sleeves, which should have seemed modest and sober – except that it was of some sort of shiny, almost iridescent material which clung to her. The brooch with the hand clasping a sword hilt hung as a pendant on a slender gold chain about her neck, nestling just above her breasts.

Faramir swallowed, even though his mouth had gone dry. Small, but perfectly formed breasts. He found that his treacherous imagination was already conjuring up the feel of them in his hands. _Valar save me, I'm lost. _They would fit perfectly… _I really should not be thinking of such a noble hearted lady in such a way._ She wore a swirling red skirt which swung and swayed as she moved – and stopped a handspan above her knees. Her legs – long, long legs – were clad in clinging black hose, but sheerer than the sheerest silk from Harad. The bits of her legs which were visible, that was. _Those legs… such images in my mind they conjure…_ To the knee her extremely shapely calves were encased in black leather boots with a high sheen even his drill sergeant would have deemed acceptable back when he first started his military training in his teens. _Completely lost. And I don't care._

Jane leant over and whispered in his ear. "You might want to shut your mouth and stop staring before Éomer notices and punches your lights out." Faramir came to, and turned to look at Jane, who seemed most amused. Rather hastily, he collected his thoughts.

"My apologies, Mistress Jane. I meant no disrespect." He added, unable to stop himself, "She looks so beautiful."

Jane laughed. "Makes a change to see her make the most of herself. Normally she doesn't bother." She fixed Faramir with a gimlet eye. "You do realise it's for your benefit, don't you? You'd damn well better make sure you treat her right, or _I'll_ punch your lights out."

Before Faramir could formulate an answer, Éowyn spotted the table they were sitting at and waved cheerfully, then nudged her brother and sent him to the bar. She walked over and sat down on the stool beside Faramir.

At first Faramir was uncharacteristically tongue-tied. But he relaxed as the family chatted happily (his greater ease also aided by beer). If you'd asked him afterwards what the conversation had been about, he wouldn't have been able to tell you; he just knew that he felt supremely happy.

Éomer spent quite a lot of the evening propping the bar up. It seemed he was quite taken with the barmaid. Éowyn explained that the two of them had some sort of on-off relationship. If he came home and the barmaid had a boyfriend, he'd just be cheerfully friendly; if on the other hand she happened to be single, well, it was possible to be "friends with benefits." _Other lands, other customs_, Faramir thought yet again. _But I want to be more than a friend who comforts her bed sometimes… I want to be her everything, just as she is all to me._

~o~O~o~

Éowyn looked on with amusement. It transpired that Kaz, the barmaid, was currently going out with someone, so Éomer's romantic overtures had come to nothing. Nothing daunted, he'd turned his attention to another old school friend of his, and was currently snogging her in the corner. No prizes for guessing whether he'd be coming home tonight.

She was on her way to the bar to get a round in when she almost collided with Faramir (returning, she guessed, from the loo – she wasn't going to ask – a tenner said he'd be quite a private sort of person about that kind of thing). To her amusement, the archway under which he'd paused, mid-stride, so as not to collide with her, was the one whoever had done the Christmas decorations had chosen as location for the mistletoe. Faramir, ever quick on the uptake, spotted her upward glance.

"That's the plant Éomer balanced on your head… I am guessing it's got some sort of a significance."

Éowyn willed herself not to blush. "Ah, it's just a silly Christmas tradition. If you find yourself underneath it with someone else, you kiss… You don't have to, of course, not if you don't want to."

"Like this?" asked Faramir, and to her amazement, leant forward and kissed her softly on the brow.

Now she was definitely blushing. She offered up a silent prayer to anyone who might be listening, that the lighting was too low for her blush to show. She tried not to meet Faramir's eye, then failed by glancing up at him. He was looking at her with a faint smile on his face – the same sort of smile he'd had earlier, the smile that was part friendly, part challenge, part… something else.

"Not exactly."

"How, then?" His voice had taken on that slightly dangerous tone it had held that morning, when he'd told her he was ahead on points in their sword fight. A faint smile played about his lips. She had a feeling he knew exactly _how._ For a moment, she wavered, wondering what to say. How to get out of this awkward situation. If indeed she wanted to get out of the situation. Then she simply thought _Ah, fuck it_, and reached up and took a handful of his shirt front, pulled him down towards her and kissed him, full on the lips.

Then let go, and retreated half a step. _Make or break… how's he going to react?_

"Oh, I think I see," he said, so quietly she almost didn't hear him over the music. Then he took her hand and pulled her back towards him, sliding his other hand round the small of her back. His lips, when they made contact with hers, were soft, just a little chapped in places, his kiss gentle… And then suddenly it changed, in an instant, for both of them. She wanted him with an intensity she had never known before, never even come close to knowing before. Hands clutching at fabric, searing heat that could be felt on the flesh beneath, hot breath on fevered skin, lips, tongues. Éowyn was swept away on a tide of sheer need, clinging to Faramir's shoulders, kissing him with complete desperation and utter abandon, while he held her close against him, pulling her against every contour of his body.

Then just as suddenly as it had started, the kiss ended. Faramir moved back slightly and stood, still holding her hands, looking down at her. The slightly cocky, teasing look that had been on his face before the kiss was gone, replaced by one of stunned wonder. She could see his chest rising and falling – he was as breathless as she was. She felt as though there were invisible cords tying them together, drawing them back together, like a magnet pulling on iron filings, or a planet pulling a moon into orbit. He was just beginning to pull her hands gently towards him, leaning into her, when…

"Either get a room, or get me another beer." Éowyn almost jumped out of her skin. Éomer had appeared behind her like the _phantom of the bloody opera or something. _

"Says you..." she retorted. Faramir rather abruptly dropped her hands and made an embarrassed coughing noise.

Unable to meet his eyes again, especially not with Éomer playing third wheel, she headed for the bar as fast as her legs would carry her, muttering, "Beer… pint of mild, three pints of bitter, cinzano and lemonade…"

As Kaz pulled the pint of mild, she grinned at Éowyn.

"So… that kiss! Remember the scale we used to have at school – how did it score? Romantic or fuck-me-now?"

Éowyn could feel her cheeks flaming. She certainly wasn't going to answer that one. But a treacherous voice in her head supplied its answer anyway. _Right now! And tomorrow. And every day for the rest of our lives. And fight with me, and make up with me, and be by my side and…_ _Oh shit. Oh. Shit. OH, SHIT!_ For a moment she couldn't speak at all. She certainly wasn't going to say any of that out loud. She tried distraction. "Didn't the scale start at 'three day old dead haddock'?"

"Get away! Even from over here, I could see that kiss wasn't dead haddock…"

Éowyn laughed. "Very nice. Let's just leave it at that." While thinking, _Oh fuck, I think my world's just been turned upside down._

~o~O~o~

The rest of the evening seemed to take on a dreamlike quality. Éowyn and Faramir sat close to one another but (after Éomer's interruption) felt too reticent to touch. Even so, she could feel the warmth of his body even across the slight gap between them. Theo and Jane did most of the talking – the two young people suddenly seemed tongue tied.

About half past ten, Eowyn noticed her brother sneaking out the bar with the girl he'd been snogging. Sure enough a few moments later, her phone pinged.

She turned to Jane. "That was Eomer – he wants me to let you know he's staying over at Ellie's tonight."

Jane shook her head. "He never changes. Do you think he'll ever settle down?"

"It's like musical chairs for young blokes," said Theo. "They play the field, then when they turn thirty, they settle down with whoever's on the sofa with them at the time."

"How romantic. Surely you weren't like that with Sue?" Jane said, giving him a sidelong look. (She and Sue had been good friends, back in the day, even though Sue had been ten years or so older. The two couples had spent a lot of time together, before Sue got cancer, and Jane's husband buggered off with that floozy from accounts leaving her with two kids and the money from a part-time job at the Co-op to raise them on.)

"Course not. Last of the great romantics, me. We were the exception that proves the rule," Theo responded with a wink. "You should know that. Champagne and rose petals all the way with me." Jane rolled her eyes. Theo grinned, then added, "Time for one last round, I think."

It didn't seem long before Kaz rang last orders, and they were decanted into the night. It was a cold, crisp night, and Theo and Jane set off at quite a brisk pace, complaining that they'd freeze if they hung around. Faramir and Eowyn set off at more of a dawdle, and soon a gap of twenty or thirty yards opened up. Eowyn wondered if she could manage to brush accidently against his hand and get him to take hold of hers, or better still, jostle his shoulder and end up with his arm round her.

Instead, he surprised her by taking her hand and tucking it in the crook of his elbow, like they were in some BBC costume drama, all crinolines and regimental scarlet and minuets in the ballroom. She almost laughed, then realised it felt rather nice, and snuggled against him. Neither of them seemed to feel like talking; they both discovered that the silence was a comfortable one, and didn't need to be filled with chatter, just enjoyed. After a while, Faramir started to hum wordlessly, almost absent mindedly.

With a start, Eowyn realised it was the song from the radio. _Would that my love were in my arms, and I in my bed again._ She snuggled a bit closer, and Faramir suddenly leant in and dropped a kiss on her hair. Her stomach did a sort of somersault, which would have felt absurd had it not felt so nice.

Before she could think of where she wanted to go with this, she suddenly found that the two of them had arrived at the front gate. They got inside to find Jane already making a pot of tea before bed, while Theo paid Izzy for the babysitting. Somehow, whatever might have been about to happen got swept away on a tide of domesticity, and preparations for bed. Reluctantly, she inflated the air mattress and spread the sleeping bag on top of it.

~o~O~o~

Faramir burrowed down under the quilt, quite glad of a night without Éomer's snores. But definitely not glad at having said goodnight to Éowyn. If he shut his eyes, instead of feeling himself drifting off to sleep, he found himself re-living every heartbeat of their kiss. And thinking about the walk home. A fragment of one of Mardil's poems came to his mind: _So to intergraft our hands as yet/ Was all the means to make us one/ And pictures in our eyes to get/ Was all our propagation… _He smiled into the darkness. At least he was merely at the stage of quoting other people's poetry, not trying to write his own. Maybe his case wasn't completely useless, yet.

Suddenly the door opened a crack.

"Are you still awake?" Éowyn, dressed now in pyjamas, slipped into the room, pulling the door to behind her. She switched on the bedside lamp, and a warm glow filled the room. Faramir looked up at her, stunned by her sudden appearance.

She drew a deep breath. "You know you were humming that song on the way home… Was that an invitation?"

Faramir found he couldn't speak. Instead, wordlessly, he lifted the corner of the quilt. Then he found his voice. He managed just one word. "Yes…"

Éowyn smiled, a dazzling smile, then stepped across the room and slid into the bed beside him, and he wrapped her in his arms.

~o~O~o~

_AN: As Tom Lehrer put it, "Plagiarise, let no-one else's work evade your eyes, That's why the good lord made your eyes, so don't shade your eyes, but plagiarise, plagiarise, plagiarise… only please to remember, always to call it research." Mardil's words of course are really John Donne's, and the line about comforting someone's bed is loosely adapted from Julius Caesar._


	11. Chapter 11

_AN: It's customary in a lot of fanfic to put Anglo-Saxon into the text, edh and thorn and wen and all. And we all pretend we took Anglo-Saxon 101 and can read this stuff fluently. Confession time! I can't. (Wave and fluid dynamics, I'm your woman, Anglo Saxon not so much). So what I offer in what follows is a transliteration of how it sounded to me (and therefore how I imagine it would sound to Jane and Theo) when I listened to a recording of someone reading the poem I've stolen. _

~o~O~o~

Faramir was woken by a horrible bleeping noise. Lazily, Éowyn disentangled herself from his embrace and reached out to turn her phone off. Then, equally lazily, she slid across him to get out of bed, pausing to kiss him slowly and thoroughly. He pulled her tight against him as her blonde hair cascaded round both of them, flowing like silk across his shoulders.

"By the Valar, woman, you're going to be the death of me."

"Yeah, but you'll die a happy man." She planted another kiss, light and teasing, on his lips.

She wriggled out from under the bedclothes and picked up her discarded pyjamas, pulling them on (to Faramir's disappointment). He reached out and caught her hand.

"Stay."

"I'd love to." She gave him a dazzling smile, then became serious. "But do you really want to explain to Jane what her kids saw when they came looking for Éomer?"

Faramir let her hand drop. "Morgoth's balls, no."

"Yeah. Exactly. So I'd better get back downstairs."

Éowyn tiptoed down to the sitting room and crawled into the sleeping bag on the air mattress, then gave a huge yawn. She wondered how much sleep they'd actually got – not much. She was going to be so dead today. She really should try to get some sleep before the kids started charging round the place. She wasn't sure if she could though – every nerve ending seemed to be singing. She rolled onto her front and clutched the pillow to her. Then laughed out loud at the thought of how ridiculous she was being.

~o~O~o~

It turned out there wasn't a whole lot of point in trying to sleep anyway – quite soon the household started to stir. Theo was up first, just before 7.00, getting ready for the day's work. Next was Jane – she had a short day, but had still signed up for a shift at the Co-Op 10 till 4, knowing Éowyn and Éomer would be around to look after the kids. By 7.30, Theo had left for the day, and Jane was feeding the children unicorn hoops. Éowyn and Faramir were sitting nursing coffee, feeling simultaneously elated and shell-shocked.

Jane noticed the almost continuous accidental-but-not-really touches, the brush of hands, the jostling of elbows on the counter, the touch of knee against knee. But she was far too wise a woman to pursue the question of what last night's sleeping arrangements had been in the absence of Éomer. In any case, that didn't worry her so much as the way the two of them looked at one another – utterly moonstruck. There was no doubt about it: Éowyn was in way over her head. And Jane feared she'd be the one picking up the pieces.

She phoned the doctor about Faramir – the earliest appointment she could get for someone not registered at the practice was the end of next week. Still, at least she'd tried. That done, she set off for work, leaving Éowyn instructions to take the children to the park, instructions which Éowyn duly followed.

She and Faramir spent a freezing cold couple of hours pushing swings, lifting children up climbing frames, down from climbing frames, spinning roundabouts. On another day, they would have ended up bored senseless. But today, the minutes and quarter hours flew by, in a haze of want for one another, spurred on by moments of surreptitious contact whenever the children weren't looking – his hand in the small of her back, her hand on his arm, their shoulders touching. When the children were out of earshot, they whispered sweet nothings. When the children disappeared inside the wooden fort, or down the concrete tunnels underneath the bank the slide was built on, they snatched kisses, all the sweeter for being so quick.

The fresh air seemed to work wonders on the children – when they got home, Kelly and Callum wolfed down the chicken nuggets, oven chips and beans Éowyn had been told to feed them for lunch. She managed to rustle up an omelette for herself and Faramir; he chopped up a quite passable salad to go with it.

Éomer slunk back into the house just after lunch, looking suitably dissolute and not much more awake than Faramir and Éowyn. Hung over and sleep deprived he may have been, but that didn't stop him noticing the tension between his sister and her dark haired nutter. _Oh bugger, shouldn't have left her alone._ He managed to get a moment with her in the kitchen (as he made himself a very large, very strong mug of coffee). Not that he got much sense out of her. In fact the only thing he did get out of her was an announcement that it was now his turn for a few nights on the sitting room floor, while she took the bedroom. With Faramir. This was delivered with an icy, slightly belligerent stare which seemed to say _And don't you dare say a word._ Then she swanned out of the kitchen before he could say anything.

Jane came home to find Éomer sitting in an armchair drinking coke (the sugary variety), and eating crisps and a bag of the kids' giant chocolate buttons, keeping half an eye on the kids as they played hungry hippo. Éowyn was asleep on the sofa with her head on Faramir's lap, his fingers nestled in her hair. He in turn had his long legs stretched out on the coffee table, head back against the back of the sofa. He was also fast asleep.

It wasn't until much later, after the children were in bed, that Theo and Jane sat the three of them down at the kitchen table. Theo produced an old wooden box. In fact, old didn't seem quite to do it justice, Éowyn thought. Ancient might be closer to the mark. It was about the size of a shoebox, a dark wood with a fine grain which circled in tight whorls. It had elaborately wrought hinges and a lock and key in some almost black metal with a dull sheen to it. Theo opened it. There was some cloth, folded up, and lying on top of it, a book. Beneath the cloth lay a dagger in a leather sheath and a belt buckle in the shape of a serpent or perhaps a dragon, chasing its own tail.

"There wasn't a lot of stuff with you when you were found as children – just a sacking bag with a few bits and pieces, stuffed between the two of you on the back seat. The brooches you know about, but there was also this book." Theo produced an ancient looking volume, bound in leather, with interlocking knotwork patterns tooled into the cover. He opened it.

"It's not English," said Éomer.

"I know," said Theo. "We've taken it to dozens of antique booksellers over the years, and no-one seems to recognise the type of writing. One guy joked it needed the Rosetta Stone. Several have suggested it's some sort of elaborate hoax."

"Wait," Faramir suddenly interrupted him. He pulled the book to him. "It's written in the Cirth." He paused, resting his chin on his hand for a moment in concentration. "I think it's a transliteration of some Rohirric. Not a language that's usually written down, but someone's done their best."

The others looked at him in puzzlement. He might as well have been talking Ancient Greek for all the sense he made to them. Then he started trying to read it aloud, hesitantly, with gaps as he struggled to make sense of it.

"_Eorl mathlohduh, bohrd havenoduh, wahnd wahkneh ash, wohrdum meldeh, eerdeh und andreh, ayaff imm andswarreh: "Yeh-hersst du, Balchotha, hwhat thees folck sayeth? Brimmanna bohdah, abayod efft ahnyon, sayeth eenum lay-ohdum, michlay lathra spell, that hayre stend unforcouth, Eorl mitt hass warroduh, tha willuh yahlyeean ethell thisneh, folck und foldan."_

Éowyn froze in shock. "I've heard that language before. It's… As if I knew it when I was a child, but I've forgotten it. It feels like… it feels like home."

"Romany?" asked Jane.

"No, that's not Romany," Theo said.

Éomer too had been sitting with a look of stunned amazement on his face. "Éowyn's right. But I… I think I do remember bits of it. Say it again, a bit at a time."

Faramir repeated it a phrase at a time, and Éomer tried to guess at the meaning.

"I think it starts with a name, Eorl. Eorl made a speech. He held up his shield. His staff made of ash. And… Nope, I'm stuck with this bit."

"My Rohirric is a bit rusty, but I think it means 'formed words together'," Faramir said. "Then something about being angry and… determined, I think, and gave an answer."

"'Do you hear?' Now I'm stuck. Is Balchotha another name?" Éomer's next attempt ground to a halt.

"A nationality – 'Man of Balchoth', one of the Wainriders – they tried to invade from the East, 500 years ago – 500 years in my world, that is."

"Do you hear, man of Balchoth, what this people says?" Éomer frowned.

Faramir picked up where he'd left off. "Report back, something-or-other. (I'm guessing he's a messenger, being sent back to his warlords). Give your people a report that they will hate. Tell them a… strong? Unconquerable? Not sure of the word. Anyway tell them some sort of strong leader stands waiting to fight them with his war troop. One who will defend his land and people. I'm not sure I've got that entirely right but that's the gist."

Faramir paused, then said. "I think its from an epic poem, one not normally written down. It would usually be sung aloud by a bard. From the country to the north of my own, our allies, the Rohirrim. It's the epic poem about Eorl the Young, founder of their nation."

Jane and Theo sat, open mouthed, stunned not so much by what Faramir had said, but by the fact that Éomer seemed to remember, from his early childhood, fragments of this strange language from another world. Even Éowyn, though she'd only have been a small child, remembered the sounds and rhythms of the language as familiar.

Éowyn sat staring at the text in front of her, but the writing simply seemed to blur. She had the beginnings of a headache, and a churning feeling in her stomach. Never before had she felt this sensation of rootless confusion, of the world tilted on its axis.

Faramir began to leaf through the book. "More stanzas." He shut it and turned it over in his hands, looking for clues to its origin. Then he opened it again, this time at the very start. And looked shocked.

"There's an inscription in a form of Sindarin – my language – on the fly leaf. Written in Tengwar rather than Cirth. And a drawing…"

Éowyn turned ghostly pale. "The drawing. It's the white tree – the white tree on the scabbard of your sword."

Jane, still seeking a rational explanation of the deeply irrational, said "It could just be a coincidence. Lots of people have trees in their mythologies. Didn't the Norsemen have a sacred tree?"

"But this looks exactly alike," Éowyn said.

Faramir traced the flowing, cursive script with a finger. Then he started to read.

"To the one chosen to seek for the knight and the swordsman, greetings. Those whom you have sought and found are my daughter's children, hidden from the sight of men to protect them. They will lead you to the means to save both the Riddermark, and Gondor. Seek for the carving of the tree; the path that leads to it will bring you home. Morwen, Dowager Queen of the Mark, T.A. 3003."

There was a stunned silence. Faramir looked round at the shocked faces. The white tree, he supposed, could have been a coincidence. Jane could be right when she pointed out that many peoples, by chance, used similar trees among their icons and sacred signs. But the fact that Éomer could understand the language of the Mark – that had clearly shocked all of them, especially Theo and Jane, to their very core.

Suddenly Faramir felt exhausted and disheartened, almost miserable. These people were so kind, so good hearted, so generous, their lives so warm and happy and untouched by war or the Shadow – and he had appeared from nowhere and turned everything upside down. He had a strong sense, a premonition almost, of a train of events set in motion, and now impossible to stop.

It was Theo who spoke first. "I've seen that tree before too… I need to go and get Sue's things down from the loft. Come and give me a hand, Éomer."

Faramir sat at the kitchen table, and took Éowyn's hand. He could feel it shaking slightly; come to think of it, he wasn't entirely sure his were any too steady either. Jane did what she always seemed to do when she was at a bit of a loss – she put the kettle on and popped a couple of teabags in the teapot.

Ten minutes later, Theo and Éomer returned. Theo had a sketch book tucked under his arm. "It's from a holiday we took, a year or so after we got married," he explained. "We went to Wales – near Cader Idris. Sue was taken with the idea of druids and Merlin, and King Arthur and all that. One day we went for a walk up this really lonely valley. There was a reservoir at the bottom of the valley – they'd dammed the river and flooded part of it, and there was a village under the water, the locals said. It seemed a sad sort of place. Anyway, we walked up the hill for a mile or so and came upon this old chapel. Sue was really taken with the carvings. She drew one of them."

He leafed through the book until he found the page he wanted. "Here." He laid it on the table.

There, sketched in pencil, was a perfect replica of the tree in Morwen's book, and, in turn, of the tree on the scabbard of Faramir's sword.

"Where is this?" Faramir asked. "Because I think this is where we need to go."

~o~O~o~

_AN: The poem is the Battle of Maldon._


	12. Chapter 12

That night, in the warmth beneath the quilt, and dim glow of the bedside lamp, wrapped one another's arms, Éowyn asked Faramir the question she'd been afraid to ask.

"What will happen next?" She did what she'd been wanting to do for days, and brushed the stray locks of dark hair back from his cheek.

"I don't know. My best guess is that there is some sort of treasure, some thing of great magic and power, that I must find and take back. But what it is, I know not."

Éowyn rested her cheek against his chest, and took his hand, interlacing their fingers. Past experience had taught her to be reticent, to make light of her feelings, to keep herself protected. It didn't seem to work with this man. Something about him made her throw caution to the winds. "I don't want to lose you. I don't want you to go back to your world."

"Nor I you. If I could, I would stay. You are the most precious treasure in the world to me. You are the woman I would spend the rest of my life with, whether long or short, were I given that choice." Faramir's voice was low and caressing, filled with need and hurt.

For a moment Éowyn felt as though she'd forgotten how to breathe. She had known Faramir was… Her thoughts ground to a halt for a moment. She didn't have the words for this sort of thing – it felt as though no-one in her world, in this time, had the words for this sort of thing. That Faramir was, what? _Keen on her? Besotted? Fond of her? _All those silly phrases that she used to hide from the truth. Somewhere, though, she knew this was more. But to have such a clear declaration. From any of the men she had dated, it would have sounded ridiculous. (And if she was honest, she supposed none of them would ever have felt inclined to say it anyway – what was it Éomer said? That she only kissed frogs who stayed frogs?) But from Faramir, it came across as straightforward honesty.

And as for its effect on her… It felt like a stupid way to describe it, but the only way she could account for the effect his voice, his words had on her, was that her heart felt as if it was swelling with a mixture of joy and sadness. The corners of her mouth twitched in the beginnings of a smile. How ridiculous she was being. Then mentally she berated herself for cowardice. She should be able to meet straightforward honesty with equal honesty of her own, tell him what she felt.

And yet, and yet. She knew there was a "but" coming.

"I would stay with you if I possibly could. But my whole world stands on the brink of war, a war which, should we lose, will see my whole nation dead or enslaved, tortured, corrupted beyond all imagining." Faramir's voice cracked. "I have to go back."

Éowyn said nothing, just tightened her grip on his hand. In response, he tightened his grip on her shoulder, pulling her in even closer against him. The silence stretched out. Beneath her cheek, he felt a wetness on his chest.

Eventually she let go of his hand and brushed away the tears with the back of her own. She turned her face towards him, and wriggled up so she could kiss him.

"I suppose we'd better make the most of the time we have got," she said, in a slightly choked voice.

Another stanza of poetry haunted Faramir's mind as he kissed her back. He whispered it to her, between kisses. "_Thus, though we cannot make our sun stand still/ Yet we can make her run."_

~o~O~o~

They set of the next morning, early, having borrowed Jane's car. Éomer took the first turn at the wheel, Éowyn in the passenger seat, Faramir folded up somewhat uncomfortably in the back. His pain was only increased when Éomer turned on his favourite play list. Although, in an odd sort of way, Éomer's presence, and the dreadful din, made Faramir feel better. He couldn't get maudlin, not with another person there to witness it.

The road wound around uncomfortably as Éomer tackled the corners with enthusiasm. – Éowyn had said something incomprehensible about "heading north to hit the M40". Through the window Faramir could see trees. At one point Éomer had to hit the brakes and swerve to avoid a small roe deer, which hurtled off into the undergrowth.

After what felt like a lifetime but was probably only a couple of hours, they stopped to swap drivers, and Éowyn told Éomer very firmly that it was his turn to be squashed into the back.

"We'll stop and swap again at Bridgenorth – we can grab some fish and chips."

"Christ, we won't need to eat for a week..." Éowyn muttered.

As they stretched their legs, she also seized the opportunity to give Faramir a kiss, which he returned with considerable enthusiasm, while Éomer made vomiting noises, then told them that they should get in the bloody car and behave themselves.

Comfortably ensconced in the front seat, Faramir stretched his legs out with considerable relief, and retuned the radio with even more relief. He found Radio 3 and gave a contented sigh.

"Bloody Rupert," muttered Éowyn, but she also put her hand on his leg for a moment, before having to return it to the gear stick.

"Hands on the wheel where I can see them, sister dearest!" came Éomer's voice from the back seat.

Éowyn found herself wondering whether all Radio 3 documentaries had to pass some special test to make sure they were sufficiently earnest and high-brow before they aired. This one was about "musical portraits of political leaders." It started with opera – from Monteverdi's take on Nero, through Donizetti doing a very Italian version of Mary Queen of Scots, to Britten's Elizabeth the first. Éowyn decided it was all a bit screechy and over-blown for her tastes. Then on to symphonies – Beethoven's portrait of Napoleon (Éowyn laughed out loud when, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Faramir jump at a suddenly discordant bit), and Shostakovich's portrait of Stalin, a _musical portrait of a monster_ as the announcer put it.

"Wonder what they'd have made of my father," Faramir observed, which of course prompted the question of who his father was, and why some Russian dude from the last century might have been interested in writing music about him. So Faramir started to explain, and before long was bogged down in a complicated explanation of his country's history and politics.

It gradually became clear to Éowyn that Faramir had, how could she put this? Downplayed his background. He, or at least his family, was a highly important one… his father was pretty much king in a kingdom with an absolute monarchy. It also became clear, as much from the gaps and the things left unsaid as from Faramir's actual words, that his father was a complicated man, and Faramir's relationship with him was similarly complicated, even painful. Driven by duty and principle, but not always by warmth. Faramir seemed simultaneously to admire him, yet have reservations about some of what he did. It was also clear that he yearned for his father's approval yet not get it. The approval apparently went entirely to Faramir's elder brother; despite this, Éowyn could tell that Faramir adored his big brother.

The phrase which came to Éowyn's mind in connection with Faramir's family was "messed up." She decided it was a bloody good thing she was unlikely ever to meet his father – she didn't think she'd like him in the slightest, nor (she was pretty certain) would he like her. Maybe the Russian dude would be the ideal guy to draw a musical portrait of him.

Gondor's history turned out to be even more complicated and messy than Faramir's family. The great wave of Numenor, the kinslaying, Isildur, the ring, Sauron, the disappearance of the line of kings, the line of the stewards… it all began to blur into one long, confusing muddle to Éowyn. It was like listening to an amalgam of ancient history and myth, all blended together, in a story where the mythical was taken as seriously as the historical. It was mad. Mind you, this whole thing was mad – here she and Éomer were, with this strange man from God only knew where, off in pursuit of an ancient chapel holding a magical artefact which would change the course of a war in another world. Utterly mad.

And yet, she thought, as she sat on the stone wall in front of the chippy, eating what Éomer described as "a whale and a bucket of chips", however mad the whole enterprise was, she was certain of one thing. Even though she was probably about to lose him, she loved this man. She shook her head as if in an effort to clear it, and popped another chip into her mouth.

Bloody typical. It summed up her life really. Only she could have the earth-shattering realisation that she'd finally fallen in love with a nice bloke, while sitting out side a chip shop in the middle of nowhere. And only she could have timing quite that lousy, to realise this while on her way to help him back to another world and out of her life forever.

~o~O~o~

The rest of the journey passed uneventfully. Night had fallen before they reached the village near the foot of Cader Idris, and Faramir had begun to doze in the back seat. He was woken by the streetlights – few and far between. The hamlet seemed to consist of a main street with stone houses with slate roofs, and not much else. In the passenger seat Éowyn consulted her phone.

"Third house on the left past the chapel," she said to her brother.

Éomer came to a halt outside the cottage she'd indicated. Again, she checked her phone, then tapped numbers into the keypad by the door, opening the metal box to find the door key to the cottage. With a sigh of relief, they switched the lights on.

The cottage was tiny – one room downstairs with a sofa (which according to the description doubled as a bed), a table and one end turned into a small kitchen, and a bathroom and bedroom upstairs. Once they'd brought the bags in (including a bag of food Jane had set aside for them to take with them), Éomer made a pot of tea. Then he and Éowyn fried up some sausages and served them up in bread rolls. They followed it up with a large slab of Jane's Christmas cake, then did the washing up, Éomer washing, Faramir drying.

Afterwards, each with a mug of tea, they spread the map out on the table, and Éomer pointed out where Theo thought the chapel was. They would have to leave the village on the road, then after about a mile, take a path up a narrow side valley, first through some woods, then into open moorland. There was a river to be crossed, and from the tight contours, the valley in which it ran was steep and narrow at that point, but fortunately the map showed a bridge. Another couple of miles over a saddle between two hills took them into a second valley, parallel to the first, which was where Theo thought the chapel lay.

Éomer folded the map up, and Éowyn went to get more tea. She came back with the pot, and a pack of cards. The cards didn't look quite like the ones Faramir was used to, but (to no-one's particular surprise) he turned out to be a quick study, and won several hands. Then he amused them by showing them some tricks, and demonstrating an ability to skim cards, not merely from the top or bottom of the deck, but from the middle as well.

"Remind me never to play against you for money," said Éomer, with a laugh.

Faramir answered very solemnly that he would never dream of cheating friends (which left Éowyn wondering who he would cheat, and in what circumstances – it seemed rather out-of-character). Then Éomer claimed first dibs on the bathroom, saying that since he was sleeping on the couch he might as well get everything he needed to do upstairs out of the way (by which Éowyn guessed he meant _And get safely back downstairs out of earshot before you two go off to bed_).

In fact, Éomer needn't have worried. Éowyn crawled into bed feeling unbelievably tired from the drive, and emotionally strung out by the events of the past few days. She had had every intention of making love to Faramir, but as soon as she felt the warm comfort of his body next to hers, and the softness of the pillow, she fell asleep.

Faramir, on the other hand, couldn't sleep. He was long familiar with this sort of night. They were, thank Nienna, a mercifully rare occurrence, but when they did happen, he knew there was no fighting them. Sometimes they stemmed from waking up, having dreamt of the great wave again. Other times they arose from troubling events in the day – a near miss with his troops and a band of marauding orcs, having to discipline a soldier for dereliction of duty (a ghastly task, given the draconian punishment that awaited the worst cases), meetings with his father. Yet other times they arose from anxiety about the morrow. Tonight, he was wound far too tight to sleep, both by the uncertainty of what tomorrow would bring, and the horrible realisation that he was about to be parted from Éowyn.

He alternated between staring out of the window at the sky – currently cloudless, with a three-quarter moon shedding a cold, ethereal light into the room (was the moon a man in this world, or a woman, to cast such soft light over his beloved?) - and looking at Éowyn as she slept, her face turned towards him, her arm cast across his chest. Even in the moonlight, her hair glistened.

After a couple of hours, she stirred in his arms, and her eyes opened a crack.

"Shh, go back to sleep," he murmured.

"I didn't mean to go to sleep in the first place," she whispered back, then reached up and kissed him, lightly. She looked at him expectantly, a look of yearning and desire on her beautiful features. In answer, he threaded his fingers through her hair and gently pulled her in for another kiss, then another. Gentleness turned to slow heat, then to a burning fire.

And then, in the midst of the burning fire, Éowyn wrapped her long legs around Faramir's hips and held him there, stilled for a moment.

"I need to feel all of this, to remember all of this. I have the weirdest feeling that in the future I will need to _know_ what it is I have to remember." Her voice came as a whisper in the near darkness. She reached a hand up and stroked his cheek, and held him for a moment longer, looking up at his face, the way the moonlight cast shadows. Then she loosened her grasp and moved with him once more.

~o~O~o~

_AN: My goodness, this quick parody has grown into quite an epic. Another three or four more chapters to go, I think (two of them already written in first draft)._

_Thank you to everyone for reviews. Earthdragon: yes, Wales is magical (I always think of it in connection with Alan Garner's wonderful novels, and of course, parts of Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising sequence). Though I must confess Sindarin is either French or Italian in my mind (according to mood – both beautiful languages), and Quenya I think of as Latin. Your mention of Ladybower takes me back to my twenties, driving over the Snake Pass between Manchester and Sheffield (by that stage, I and my friends were dotted around Lancashire and South/West Yorkshire). The Peak District is a part of the world I love dearly – it's where I learned to climb, and I have spent many, many happy days on the gritstone edges there._


	13. Chapter 13

After a breakfast of porridge and toast, the three of them emerged into the street. Faramir wasn't quite sure what he'd been expecting, but (apart from the parked cars) he felt as though he had stepped away from the strange new world of shining metal machines and magical devices, into an older, simpler world, more akin to his own.

The street wound uphill, lined by small stone cottages, with slate roofs stained black by the steady rain which fell from a lowering sky. Above the roofs, he could see the steep slopes of the hills surrounding the valley. The ground cover had died back, shrivelled by the short days of winter (it suddenly struck him that despite the relatively mild climate he was much further north than Gondor, at least if things worked the same way here). The heather had faded to a dull brown, the pastures were a gloomy shade of faded green, the trees stark and leafless against a steely grey sky. Between the muted palette, the steep valley walls pressing in on them, and the steady rain, he felt almost claustrophobic.

They reached the end of the line of houses, and down hill, to the left, Faramir could see glimpses of a dark, ink-black lake, its surface flat beneath the steady rain, almost oily and inert.

"I guess that's the reservoir with the drowned village beneath it," said Éowyn.

"Poor souls," Faramir said.

To his surprise Éowyn grinned, and took his hand. "No, they'll have been given plenty of time to move, and new houses to move to… it wasn't drowned suddenly in an accident." Faramir felt slightly foolish, but as it had caused Éowyn to smile, he was happy to play the fool. He squeezed her hand in return, and gave her a gentle tug towards him, so her shoulder bumped into his. From behind them, Éomer made a vague harrumphing noise.

They each had a pack, with some water and sandwiches and a few spare clothes. Éomer had the book and sketch book, wrapped in a dry bag. Wrapped inside a spare jumper, Éowyn's pack contained the dagger in its sheath. Faramir had made his various weapons into a long bundle, wrapped in a bit of old sackcloth to disguise the contents, and strapped them to the side of his rucksack. Éowyn said they could always claim it was fishing gear if anyone asked. He wasn't at all sure this would be a convincing answer.

There was another thing he wasn't sure of either: what to expect when they reached the chapel. What sort of object could it be that lay hidden? A sword, perhaps? That felt like the most obvious answer. History was positively littered with lost swords, not least among them, the sword that was broken. Mentally, he searched through the ancient history he knew of. He knew that Mithrandir had spent many days in the archives in Minas Tirith, researching the lore of Isildur's bane – but what it was, he was not sure. He guessed it was a thing of great power taken from the enemy on the battlefield in that fateful battle at the end of the Second Age. Subtly, cautiously, he had tried to quiz Mithrandir, only to be rebuffed with something close to evasiveness. Or perhaps, perhaps it was one of the seeing stones, the Palantiri, mentioned in some of the dusty volumes in the library in the Steward's Palace. He had come upon his father, consulting those at length, on several evenings. In fact, come to think of it, last time he had looked in the library, the volumes had disappeared, he presumed into his father's private rooms for still closer study.

And he still wasn't sure, as he walked hand-in-hand with Éowyn, what part she and her brother were meant to play. Had they been sent to this world as guardians of the artefact, and eventually his guides on the quest to retrieve it? So it seemed. Had Vairë woven this quest and their part into it from the beginning of time? And if so, had she woven into it that he should fall utterly, irredeemably in love with Éowyn, or had that been some chance quirk of fate which not even one of the Valar could have forseen?

The water dripped from his hood. Éomer had offered him some clothes of his own, but Faramir had brought the clothes in which Éowyn had found him that first night, trousers of a soft leather, boots, a woollen tunic, and his cloak. His Christmas present from Éowyn was safely stowed in the pack they had loaned him.

They made short work of the mile or so up the road to the turning, Éowyn and Éomer striding out easily. However soldiers were trained in this land, they seemed every bit as fit as his own Rangers.

As they walked, brother and sister chattered to one another, making gentle (and not so gentle) fun of each other.

"So, how badly hung over were you yesterday?" Éowyn asked Éomer. "Did it come as a surprise to wake up next to Ellie rather than Kaz?"

"Ah, you cheeky mare. I _always_ remember who I've taken to bed – it's a point of principle. Cavalry man's honour. Not like you complete slappers in the infantry." Then his voice tailed off as if it dawned on him that calling his sister a slapper in front of her new man was maybe a mistake. But Éowyn took it in good part and roared with laughter.

"Sorry, we're probably really shocking you," she said to Faramir.

"Not a bit of it. My brother could probably give Éomer a run for his money when it comes to women – though like Éomer, I'm glad to say, only ever the ones who are as keen on the idea as he is. And my cousins have been known to get into the odd drunken scrape."

"Tell me more..."

"My cousin Erchirion, for instance – we were both on leave together and went to a tavern in the city. He drank too much brandy, fell madly in love (well, he said it was love, I'm not sure that's the word I would have chosen) with the barmaid, was rebuffed, and announced dramatically that he was going to desert from the army and run away to sea. I had to remind him that he was in fact in the navy, and had only just returned from the sea. In the finest nautical tradition, he changed tack at this point and promptly dropped to his knees in front of her, threatening to throw himself from the window for love of her. She was, predictably, unmoved by this (I fear variations on this theme may have been a nightly hazard of her job) and I had to explain to him that in any case his gesture waas futile, for we were on the ground floor. So then he challenged me to a duel for being so heartless, but before he could do anything about it, passed out cold on the flagstones. Took me and three other Rangers to get him home."

"Now, that shows a certain style. There's a man I wouldn't mind going to the pub with," said Éomer.

The conversation continued on the subject of various drunken escapades until they reached the turning, which took the form of a rough track with a way marker at the beginnings of a side-valley. The place where it joined the larger one they had come up was a steep hillside of tumbled boulders, with stunted trees clawing their roots into the rocky terrain. Éowyn said something about this land having once been covered in ice – the valleys had been carved out by enormous rivers of ice, of the sort now confined to the heights of the White mountains in his own world. The side valley was a cwm, she said, a hollow where ice would have collected, the end of it scoured into a steeper slope where the larger ice river had scoured away the hillside.

The path zig-zagged up through the trees, which stood, dark grey and silent, dripping into the gloom. Here, even the bird song seemed muted, though he could hear crows in the distance, cawing in the woods further down the valley. As they rose higher, though, the cloud base seemed to lift in time with their ascent, and by the time they reached the edge of the tree line, a thin light was filtering through the clouds. Judging from the way his stomach was grumbling, it must be nearing midday, but the sun was still low in the sky; further indication of how far north they were, Faramir supposed. The hanging valley now ran rather more gently uphill, with the river in its base tumbling steeply through rocky ravines and over small waterfalls. The river was in full spate, the water brown with peat and surging and frothing over the boulders, waves lapping round the bases of partially submerged trees.

They stopped for a bit to eat, sitting on boulders near the river. To Faramir's delight, in addition to ham, cheese and bread (conveniently formed into neat slabs), and an apple each, there was more of the wondrous chocolate he had been introduced to on Christmas morning. He leaned back against the rock behind, an arm round Éowyn's shoulders, his cheek against her hair, and thought there could be no better way to eat a meal than this.

After fifteen minutes or so, they set off again. The path skirted the water, sometime rising twenty or thirty feet above where the flow cascaded through a small ravine, sometimes nestling against the water's edge, a couple of times disappearing beneath the flooded river, such that for a score of paces they had to scramble above the line of where the path would lie in drier weather. It wasn't long before they saw a wooden bridge half a mile or so upstream, spanning a rocky cleft where the river ran fast. But then the twists and turns of the path cut it off from their sight once more.

Coming round a sharp corner into a slightly broader reach where the water flowed more sluggishly, they encountered other people for the first time that morning – a group in small, brightly coloured, pointed boats just big enough for a single person, clad in helmet and what looked to Faramir like a padded jacket, and wielding a double ended paddle. One at a time they took it in turns to portage their boats up above the next set of rapids, then set off, steering with great skill between the boulders to return to the reach below. One even braved the small waterfall up stream, sailing over it, then shooting the rapids. Faramir was most impressed (and somewhat self conscious – he suddenly realised that he was back in what they would see as "Robin Hood" garb).

They left the kayakers behind and continued steadily up hill. Finally, the bridge came into sight once more. As they approached it, another bank of clouds scudded across the sky, and a faint rain began to fall once more. Faramir pulled his hood over his head, and saw Éomer and Éowyn do the same with their dark green, camouflaged jackets.

When they reached the bridge, Éowyn wrinkled her nose at the sight of it. Rickety, ramshackle, rotten. But it was that or wet feet.

Éomer paused for a moment to adjust his rucksack. Meanwhile Faramir stepped out onto it, and she followed him. They got half way across, and she could feel the bridge bouncing and creaking beneath their feet. She was just about to shout to Éomer that it probably wasn't a good idea to have three of them on the bridge at once when he swung his pack back onto his back and came cantering onto the bridge.

There was an ominous cracking and splintering as several of the planks making up the deck gave way. But worse was to come. With an enormous crack of snapping wood, one of the main beams gave way, the deck lurched, and all three of them tumbled the ten feet or so into the water below.

Éowyn was dragged under, then pulled herself to the surface, spluttering. She looked around in horror at the empty river around her, and nearly panicked. But moments later Éomer broke the surface, then Faramir. The current took her and swept her towards a narrower stretch. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Faramir strike out, trying to swim to catch up with her.

Just for a moment, their fingertips touched. But almost immediately, she was caught in the rush of water cascading between two boulders, then tumbled over and over by the stopper beyond. Her face broke the surface for an instant, long enough to snatch a breath. Then her head banged against unforgiving rock, and everything went black.

_~o~O~o~_

_AN Thanks as always for the reviews._

_Earthdragon: "We__still don't know what it is that Faramir was sent into the future to collect. Is it just an artefact or is it Éowyn and Éomer as well?" Bwa ha ha… and we still don't know (yup, I'm stringing out the uncertainty. But all will be revealed soon. Re. food, I share your pain – I have recently developed gallstones, so am on a very low fat diet, so I am having to pour my culinary fantasies (fish and chips, sausage butties, Christmas cake – and of course slabs of chocolate eaten amidst the beautiful Welsh mountains) into my writing, because I don't want to put myself back in hospital._


	14. Chapter 14

Éomer laid Éowyn's body on the shingle beach. Kneeling, he bend to listen for a pulse and see if he could feel any breath. He drew back, preparing to pound on her chest. _Breathe, dammit, breath. For fuck's sake, breathe. _But even as the tide of desperation surged in him, he saw her eyelids flicker for a moment, then open. She coughed, and rolled onto her side. Propping herself up on her elbow, she retched onto the stones, leaving strings of watery bile trailing from her lips. She wiped them away with her hand, then flopped onto her back once more, chest heaving.

Behind him, Éomer heard a splashing, then the crunch of footsteps on the shingle, and turned to see Faramir, water cascading from his clothes, trudging up the beach. The Gondorian took in the sight of Éowyn lying on the shingle, motionless, and broke into a run. As he reached them, he fell to his knees beside her.

"Does my lady live?"

Éowyn tried to sit up, and took another coughing fit.

"I'll be fine."

Faramir took her hand. Éomer looked around him. In place of the lowering grey clouds and steady rain, they were now surrounded by a thick mist. But what little of the river he could make out behind him suggested a far larger body of water than the one into which they'd fallen, and the shingle beach they were now on was like nothing they had passed on the walk up stream.

"We need to get away from the bank, find somewhere we can build a fire and try to dry off a bit." Faramir's voice interrupted his survey.

"We should all have at least some spare clothes in dry bags in our packs," Éomer replied.

Faramir nodded, and then said "First, I should get my weapons out. This ducking was no accident. I taste the scent of magic on the air. I would wager we are back in my world."

He undid the sackcloth bundle tied to the side of his rucksack, and started to organise the various items. His sword he belted round his hips, one dagger went into the belt on the other side from his sword, a second he stashed inside his tunic, and a third, small one, he tucked down his boot. He looked at the quiver for a moment, before strapping it to the side of the rucksack. Then he slung his bow over his shoulder.

"Christ, man, you're a one-man walking armoury," said Éomer. He'd helped Éowyn into a sitting position and was rubbing her back gently.

"I do my best," said Faramir, dryly. Éomer found himself looking at the dark haired man almost as if for the first time. He'd grown fond of their "nutter", but had mostly seen him as a figure of fun. Suddenly, that changed. He now saw the man entirely differently, took him seriously. Memories of the fencing match came back to him, comments about not wanting to die on your enemy's sword.

The man _was_ a soldier, a real soldier. A dangerous one. Very, very dangerous indeed. Suddenly Éomer was reminded of the special forces troops he'd occasionally encountered – everything about them, stance, bearing, attitude, a sense of utter ruthlessness if that was what the situation needed. This man had it.

"Let's get under cover and get a fire started. We don't need to go far." To Éomer's surprise, Faramir drew his sword.

"Best to be ready," he said, with a slightly dark look on his face. "Can you help Éowyn?"

Faramir led the way into the woods, then stopped in a small clearing. Éomer followed, an arm round his sister. She, needless to say, started to protest.

"I'm not an invalid."

"Yes, but you do need to get into as much dry clothing as you can find." Faramir took his pack off, and fished out a dry bag. "Here – the Christmas jumper!"

"You should wear that."

"I'm used to being wet. I'll wring my clothes out in a moment, once I've got a fire started."

Éomer dug out the dry clothes they had between them – a jumper each, a pair of waterproof trousers each. It was going to be a cold night. He added a plastic bivvy bag and silvery survival blanket to the heap, then spread his rucksack out for Éowyn to sit on, and passed her some Kendal mint cake.

"I hate this stuff," she said, wrinkling her nose.

"Yeah, but it's almost pure sugar. Here, let me have a look at your head." Éomer held a Maglite between his teeth and probed Éowyn's hair. "Where's your first aid kit?"

"Right hand pocket of my sack."

Éomer opened the medical kit and wiped the cut with antiseptic wipes, before snipping away some of her hair and applying a butterfly suture. Éowyn grimaced, but made no noise. This done, he wrung out their wet clothes and hung them over a low branch. Faramir returned with the sackcloth filled with a mixture of dry grass, pine needles, twigs and larger branches. He crouched down and produced a tinder box, striking sparks onto the kindling, blowing on it until the fire caught, then feeding it with gradually larger twigs and branches. Once he was satisfied that it was burning healthily, he stood up and stripped to his braies, wringing his wet clothes out. Éomer was struck by how many scar there were criss-crossing his body.

"You should take your jumper back," said Éowyn.

"No, you keep it. I don't want you to get cold."

"I'm tougher than I look. Besides which, the sensible thing to do would be for all of us to snuggle up under the survival blanket and bivvy bag, and I don't want to do that if you're still wet."

Reluctantly, Faramir conceded the point, and his wet clothing joined the rest, hanging from the branches. Éomer found a spare pair of thermals in his rucksack and gave them to Faramir for his legs, then the three of them settled in a row, sitting on the empty rucksack for a bit of extra insulation. They pulled the thermal blanket and bivvy bag round their shoulders.

"Silver… Bright orange… Not very subtle." Faramir's distaste for the coverings showed in his voice.

"We were walking in the Welsh mountains. The whole idea is to be visible if you need rescued."

Faramir laughed, then shook his head cynically. "It may not be the best choice in our present circumstances. Have we any food?"

"Some Christmas cake, a squashed banana, a bag of nuts and half a Kendal mint cake," Éomer said.

"Which is horrible," Éowyn added.

"In that case, while it is still light..." said Faramir, and picked up his bow, then walked into the trees. He returned about three quarters of an hour later with a couple of rabbits and a pheasant. He tossed a sheathed knife and one of the rabbits to Éomer.

"What do you expect me to do with this?" Éomer asked.

Faramir shook his head. "Don't they teach you anything useful in your army? Just watch what I do and copy it." With a practised air, he paunched the rabbit then skinned and decapitated it, and trimmed off its feet, before skewering it on a stick and carefully balancing it over some hot embers. Then he plucked and gutted the pheasant. Meanwhile Éomer tried to repeat the trick with his rabbit, but before long had to admit defeat. Faramir finished the job.

Éowyn watched and laughed. "You have much to learn, young padawan," she said to her brother.

"Do you want to do it?"

"No, head wound, couldn't possibly," Éowyn replied.

"She's feeling better," Éomer said to Faramir, who broke into a broad grin, but wisely didn't respond. Instead he banked up the fire with more branches.

The rabbit and fowl were a bit stringy, rather smoky and burned in places, but they filled a hole. The men took the taste away with bits of Kendal mint cake (Éowyn said she wasn't that desperate). By agreement they decided to save the nuts and Christmas cake for breakfast. By this time, it was starting to get dark. To Éomer's surprise, Faramir handed him his sword.

"You take the first watch while you're still reasonably alert; I'll take the second. If you have to wake me, be careful how you do it." Carefully, he laid his bow and quiver within easy grabbing distance, tucked his knife near his head and settled down next to Éowyn, pulling the covers (such as they were) over the two of them. Éomer got up and felt his waterproof – sort of dryish, and better than just a single jumper, now that a bit of a breeze was getting up. He sat down on a boulder with his back to the fire, the better to protect his night vision, and stared out into the gloom.

~o~O~o~

Éowyn woke up the next morning to find herself back-to-back with her brother. Feeling rather disappointed (though at least he was warm), and extremely stiff, she carefully eased the kinks out of her neck, then turned her head round. Faramir sat on a fallen tree nearby, checking through his arrows one at a time, and using some of the feathers from last night's pheasant to repair any fletches in need of attention. Éowyn sat up. She still had a bit of a headache from the bang on her head, but on the whole felt a lot better than she had the night before. Her movement woke Éomer.

They ate the cake, and decided to save the nuts till later in the morning. Faramir left briefly to go down to the river. When he returned, he reported on what he had discovered.

"The mist has lifted. It's as I thought – the river is Anduin, the great river. We are just at the northern end of the stretch where the bank faces the island of Cair Andros. On the Anorien side."

Éomer and Éowyn looked at him with puzzled expressions, so he took a twig and sketched a map in the muddy ground.

"This is where we are. This island is Cair Andros. Here, just downstream of the island, there's a crossing and a garrison. Then the river takes a southward turn. The land over here to the east is the land my troop defends. Downstream is the city of Osgiliath, largely abandoned due to frequent raids by the enemy, but still an important crossing. Though, contrary to what my father believes, I'm not sure how much longer we can hold it. And here, to the west across the plain from Osgiliath, lies Minas Tirith, my home."

He moved the stick back to the position where they were. "Upstream, Anduin flows from the north-west at this point. This group of streams flowing across the wetlands to our north and west is the confluence of the Entwash and the Mering Stream, and it marks the boundary between the northern border of my land and yours."

"Ours?" Éowyn said.

"Do you not remember the inscription in the book saying that you were the grandchildren of Morwen and Thengel, queen and king of Rohan? You are Rohirric..." He stopped mid sentence and turned towards the wood. "Shh – I heard something."

Éowyn and Éomer fell silent. Then they too heard something – the unmistakable sound of a twig breaking beneath someone's foot. Faramir sprang to his feet, sword drawn.

"Halt, who goes there?" he called.

"Peace, my lord Faramir," said a deep, old-sounding voice. There was a movement in the undergrowth, and an elderly, gnarled hand moved aside a hazel branch. Out stepped an old man, clad in a grey cloak, a pointed hat upon his head. He was, Éowyn noted, tall and straight, despite his age, and she couldn't help thinking that the staff which he held was more an affectation than a need. He had a long, white beard, and above it, dark, intelligent eyes twinkled in a wrinkled face.

"Mithrandir," Faramir said, in tones of relief, and sheathed his sword.

"Ah, so you have completed the task I set for you."

"I fear not, friend, for we were pitched back into this world before we could reach our destination, the stone chapel in which I hoped to find some artefact of power." Faramir could not keep the disappointment out of his voice.

Mithrandir threw back his head and laughed heartily. "Faramir, Faramir. You have brought Morwen's daughter's children back, and great deeds await them. You have completed your task."

Faramir's eyes opened wide in surprise, and Éowyn couldn't help joining in the laughter.

"Wait a minute… You mean us to stay here?" Éomer asked in a shocked tone.

Abruptly, Éowyn stopped laughing. The implications began to hit her.

"I have to be back with my regiment in three days time. So does Wyn..."

Éowyn gulped. "You want us to do something here? What? How long will it take?"

Mithrandir looked at them. "The mirror of Galadriel is not so specific. I know not what you will be called upon to do, only that your deeds may play a part in swinging the course of history in our favour. You are not here simply for a short while to do something specific. This is your home, from which you were taken as children, and to which you have now returned."

Éowyn turned chalk white. "But Theo, Jane, the kids… They'll think we're dead."

~o~O~o~

Gradually, the wizard managed to explain to Éowyn and Éomer what was at stake. The future of this world, of the many people in it, hinged on the role they were to play.

Éowyn and Éomer burst into a barrage of questions, but Gandalf held out a hand to silence them. He then added a crucial (and unwelcome) piece of information: he greatly regretted it, but for all their sakes, for their own protection, he would have to cast a spell of forgetting upon the three of them. Faramir would return to Ithilien, with naught but the memory that he had been called upon to accomplish something of importance, which was now brought to fruition. Éomer and Éowyn would follow Mithrandir out of the wood onto the plain, where a trusted lord of the Rohirrim, Éothain, waited with horses (the wizard was relieved to discover the siblings could ride, and wield swords).

It would take them around two weeks to get back to Edoras, the king's city. The story would be that they had been hidden in Anorien for their own safety. During the journey, Mithrandir, with Éothain's help, would try to instil the basics of the tongue of the Mark into the siblings.

Mithrandir had not foreseen all things, however. The wizard was somewhat surprised when Faramir moved over to Éowyn and took her hands in his.

"But I don't want to forget this. I can't forget this." He turned to Mithrandir. "Is there no other way?"

Mithrandir shook his head.

Faramir looked at him defiantly, then said "Let your magic do its worst. I'll not forget this, not till the ending of the world." Then he drew Éowyn into his arms.

Faramir kissed Éowyn, a deep, passionate kiss, as if wanting to sear the memory of her lips into his consciousness so firmly it would be beyond the art of any wizard to remove it. Sadly, he loosened his grip on her and took a step back.

Then he surprised her by clasping her arm, forearm to forearm in a warrior's salute. He smiled at her.

"The next sword fight you get into, take your time – I know you can strike fast, but you need to strike fast without any risk that their slower counter will deal you a mortal blow, even as they themselves fall. And for the Valar's sake, remember to guard your legs." Then his face became sad, but in his eyes a spark of hope danced.

"Éowyn of Rohan, I will meet you again. And woo you again. And if you find it in your heart to love me a second time, I will wed you, if that be your choice."

Then, with a final salute to brother and sister, he turned and walked, straight and true, into the misty woods towards the river.


	15. Chapter 15

Through the year or more that followed, both Éowyn and Faramir had occasional glimpses of a world once known and now forgotten.

~o~O~o~

Faramir's return, a se'en-night later, was greeted with much relief by all. _Where had he been?_ the other Rangers wanted to know, but Faramir's memory was hazy. Young Firion had told them of Mithrandir's appearance, and of Faramir having been sent on a quest, but what this quest was, neither of them could tell.

Boromir was the first to notice the change in his brother's behaviour. For at least a week or two after his mysterious adventure, he seemed relaxed, refreshed almost, though somewhat melancholic, as if yearning for something. He had always been a kind and gentle man, who in another time and place would have been a brilliant scholar, devoted husband, loving father, rather than a soldier. But now Boromir had more and more frequent glimpses of the man his brother should have been, had he not been worn down by duty and the fighting of a brutal war not of his choosing.

Some of the Ithilien Rangers noticed a change too. Their captain was often quiet and thoughtful – no change there. But occasionally he showed sparks of levity, as if he'd been offered a window into a kinder, gentler world. He himself had occasional day dreams of a world where family was not overshadowed by politics, and enjoyment not snatched beneath the shadow of imminent destruction, but indulged in at leisure, with the hope of more to come on the morrow.

He also took to humming – snatches of melodies, some slow and hauntingly beautiful, others quick, and lively, yet others filled with majesty. Among the Rangers there was a young man, Carandol, who was a talented lutenist, and often accompanied the others in their drinking songs. He was particularly taken with Faramir's creations as he called them, and asked why Faramir did not learn to play them on his hautboy, or teach others to play them. The answer was cryptic; the tunes were not his to claim credit for, the captain explained. Damrod also caught him singing – the captain's favourite seemed to be a melody of gentle beauty, which would always elicit a slightly melancholic smile, as if it brought forth a memory of a happy time now lost.

Damrod asked him about it one day, as Faramir idly hummed it while fletching arrows. Did it not have words?

"I think it did, but I have long since forgotten them. The overall mood, yes, the details, no."

"What was it about?"

Faramir gave a wry smile. "Taking the most beautiful woman in the world into one's bed."

Damrod snorted. "The tune doesn't sound at all like _that_ sort of song."

"Ah," came the reply, "But this is the sort of woman one would happily lay down one's life for – or better still, live the rest of one's life with."

Damrod wandered off, shaking his head, and puzzling over the strange ways of officers, and of lords, and in particular, lords who were officers.

The occasional flashes of levity remained, though. One night he watched the Rangers singing catches and rounds (mostly with altered words of their own invention, many of them bordering on the obscene). He laughed heartily at the spectacle, then (during a lull) mentioned to Damrod a game he had a vague memory of having once come across, though where, he could not quite remember. (It occurred to Damrod that these lapses were strange, for normally his memory, like the rest of his mind, was as sharp as a knife.) Always on the search for new ways of entertaining the men (cards and dice always had the potential to turn nasty), Damrod suggested the captain teach them, and Faramir was happy to oblige.

The game had simple rules – each player in turn suggested to the next man round the circle a suitably maudlin, tear-jerking song, or work of high and noble passion and sentiment, the words of which were to be sung to the tune of the cheeriest and most ridiculous ditty the player could come up with. (Or vice versa – humorous words to a maudlin tune worked just as well). The winner was then chosen by popular acclaim. Faramir made the first suggestion, a relatively easy pairing, in the knowledge that poor Anborn couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. Anborn struggled manfully, while the rest of the Rangers howled in derision and pretended to stuff their cloaks in their ears. He in his turn landed Mablung with the lilting _The Lass who loved a Soldier _to the tune of a double-time march. Mablung, being gifted with a fair tenor voice, gave it his best, but he couldn't resist the temptation to draw out the particularly sentimental turns of phrase with a schmalzy, lingering tremolo, which made rather a mess of the rhythmic precision demanded by the march.

Round the circle the suggestions and songs went. Faramir himself took the lead for a while, his warm and agile baritone making light work of adapting _The Lay of Leithian _to the tune of that Dol Amroth dock-side favourite, _The Harlot's Hornpipe_. Damrod drew the classical _Ballad of Uinen and Osse_, to the tune of another famous Dol Amroth tavern song, the chorus of which centred round the wonders of Uinen's tits. Not surprisingly, given that both songs were about the beautiful Maia and her indubitable charms, he got the words scrambled, and the ancient epic poem of Uinen gained some quite unscholarly additions (which tickled his captain no end, having been forced to study the original Quenya as a boy).

However, when in turn Damrod passed the singing on, he inadvertently gifted the match to Angrim, who gave a masterful rendition of _The Merry Widows' Pleasures (and the Lads who Pleasured 'Em) _to the tune of _The Maiden Traduced_, lingering in an almost sobbing tone of voice on each drawn out phrase and falling cadence to most tragic effect (no matter which parts of the widows' or lads' anatomies, or the unlikely combinations thereof, were being described at that point).

It turned out that books too were now seen through the slightly altered consciousness of memories of things just out of reach. He would read of ancient loves between Elves, sealed for all eternity by the binding of two Fëar. And part of him would think "I yearn for that – no, it is not that I yearn for that, it is almost that I had it once, and lost it, and now wait for it again." The yearning had a solidity, a reality to it almost like his dreams of the great wave of Numenor. It made him think almost of the belief he had read of, in some of the cities of the distant east that were fabled to lie beyond the steppes roamed by the nomadic bands of Easterlings, of souls born and reborn over the centuries. Perhaps in a previous life, his Fëa had found its one, and now he awaited her return. Then he laughed at the ridiculous turn his thoughts had taken.

~o~O~o~

For Éowyn and Éomer the change was stranger still. "Fey-touched" people said of them. The story was not widely bruited, but still whispers passed around, of two children whose lives were under threat, hidden from sorcery in a remote homestead, cast under a spell of forgetting. For the most part the two of them kept their own council, gradually adapting to the world in which they found themselves. It was perhaps easier for Éomer, who fell into life in an Eored as if it brought to him a comforting sense of a life he knew from somewhere before.

But Éowyn was hit hard. The life she now led _was_ hard, in a very physical way. The hall, however grand the carvings, was cold through the winter and hot in summer, and the smoke from the fire pit seemed to infiltrate every corner of the living quarters. There never seemed to be enough hot water to wash properly – either herself or her clothes. She felt as though she walked the cold passageways surrounded by a faint miasma of wet dog – and unfortunately, the wet dog was her. In particular, she chafed against the restrictions placed on women. Even as a noble-born woman, there were huge limitations on what she could do. She only felt truly free when listening to the bard sing lays of the deeds of ancient shieldmaidens, or when she slipped out in the early hours of the morning to spar with Éomer, using wooden swords. After these sparring sessions, she would feel the strangest of mixed emotions. Part of her would feel her soul was soaring, having been set free from the petty restrictions of her day-to-day life. But part of her would catch a glimpse, just out of reach, of a world in which this life was hers all the time. And also, incomprehensibly, of a pair of grey eyes glittering with challenge, and then with good humour, and of a child's voice piping "A real knight would kiss the lady's hand."

The court was a very masculine environment, and what little concession there was to teaching her a woman's place in life fell to the housekeeper, and to Lady Hilde, Marshal Elfhelm's wife (who, truth be told, wasn't terribly good at this either, as she herself had no truck with the notion of a "woman's place"). But Éowyn's riding improved beyond measure, and (to Hilde's immense surprise) she was able to make herself useful, especially as the number of Riders wounded in orc attacks increased. For it turned out that she was as skilled at sewing together torn flesh as she was unskilled at embroidery. Still, she dreamt of her imagined world where women's lives were not circumscribed, where she could prove herself the equal of any man. And at times, it felt, not like a dream, but like a vision of some pre-lapsarian world where women really were free.

Several of the young Riders tried their luck with her – courting her respectfully for she was the king's sister-daughter. And while she acknowledged that some of them were passing fair, for some unaccountable reason in this land of blond and red-headed warriors, her dreams were haunted by a man with dark hair, coming undone from its binding, a few strands blowing across his cheek. Moreover, she found herself largely unmoved by the massively muscled body of a man strong enough to tame a wild stallion, and carry a lance while wearing full armour. Again, her dreams told of a man who was lithe and lean, not a muscle more than he needed for the wiry strength his body held. And when the men, in their cups, boasted in song of their own exploits, she found herself imagining a man with a dry wit and self-deprecating sense of humour. The sort of man who would allow her to laugh at him, so long as he knew she was happy to return the favour. The sort of man who could be a fool for love, and allow her to be a fool too.

But soon, all thoughts of courtship and even the soft caresses of her dreams had to be buried deep within her, never to be acknowledged, like a camp fire covered with turfs at the rumour of enemy scouts. The king's counsellor, Gríma, haunted her footsteps, and she no longer felt safe. She took to sleeping with her dagger beneath her pillow, and even went so far as to set up a cot in her room for her maid to sleep in. Soon even during the daylight hours she found herself trying to ensure she was never alone.

Gríma's evil influence affected her brother too, and it broke her heart to watch it. She had a sense, half remembered, of an easier life while they grew up, one where he grew into a gentle giant of a man, brave and decent, but friendly and open, with a ready laugh. Gríma's court (for in truth it was Gríma's court, not Théoden King's) turned him in on himself, mistrustful, guarded, cautious with people. He remained brave and decent at heart, but now a smile was rarely seen on his lips. And he became quick to anger. Most worryingly, when angry, his judgement was not always as good as it might have been. She feared for him. He was (perhaps without even realising it) engaged in a dangerous game with a master manipulator, one who did not lose his own temper, but fed on the emotions of others to further his own aims.

When the Steward of Gondor's eldest son passed through Edoras on his journey north, she was struck by a wave of familiarity. He reminded her strongly of someone she thought she had once known, though how, hidden in the remote farmhouse near the Mering Stream, she would have encountered any Gondorian nobles, was beyond her. At the same time, he was familiar and yet not so – he seemed to prompt in her a yearning, but not for him. For a brief moment, a half imagined fairy tale resurfaced in her mind, of a quieter, gentler man, yet one of unbending strength, one she could trust, not to protect her from the world, but to stand beside her as an equal as they faced the world together. She shook her head and put such foolishness from her mind.

The brief visit seemed to spark something in her mind, for from then on her vague dreams of a lithe, dark haired man took on a more solid form, giving her a more detailed picture. Sometimes he was simply there as a solid, reassuring presence, gentle and kind, sometimes she woke with immense feelings of merriment, sometimes he made her laugh (unlike the grim, unflinching warriors she was surrounded by, this man did not seem to take himself seriously). Sometimes he sparred with her in her dreams, paying her the respect of giving no quarter. Sometimes they would fight side by side against unknown enemies. And sometimes she woke, fevered with desire, acutely aware that she had just had a dream no maiden should have, of a degree of vividness no maiden should be able to conjure.

But these dreams were at odds with her daytime existence. Gríma redoubled his efforts – she found herself fending off endless attempts to catch her alone in the quiet antechambers and lonely passageways of the palace, and more than once she came upon Gríma whispering to Théoden King that surely his sister-daughter was to be kept as a precious jewel to be bestowed upon a lord on whose council the king could depend. It was done subtly. The worm was clearly playing a long game. He never explicitly said that he was the man he wished the king to consider. But when Théoden responded by suggesting nobles who might be worthy of Éowyn's hand, one by one, Gríma ruled out various alternatives… too old, too reckless, too rash, too distant from Edoras. The man she needed, he hinted, was one who had the king's ear, and who would not prevent her from nursing her beloved uncle in his dotage. And in the dark passages, Gríma would drop hints directly to her that even if the king could not be talked round, it would only take the smallest of changes in fortunes in the Mark to gift him the power to force her hand without the king's say-so.

This campaign of slow but inexorable attrition scared her so much that she even asked Éomer to list those of his comrades of sufficiently noble standing that Théoden might consider them a suitable match. A marriage of convenience to a man whom her brother could vouch for as a decent and honourable soldier was preferable to a forced marriage to the worm. She might dream of a man with grey eyes and dark hair who would fight by her side, but dreams, she was increasingly coming to realise, would not protect her in her waking hours. She even contemplated a dalliance with a merchant or squire, in fact any man whom she deemed to be kind and respectable and hard working. In the best scenario, she would fall with child and force her protectors to agree to a marriage; even if she did not, at least she would have the memory of lying with a man of her choosing before the worm could force her. Then she would find herself close to tears because nagging in her head would be a voice that said _but it should be so much more than this… _ And she would brush the tears away angrily, because however real her dreams seemed, they remained just dreams.

Those odd feelings of familiarity she had had when Boromir rode through Edoras resurfaced when another man of Numenor came to the Golden Hall. The mysterious stranger was indeed tall, dark-haired, with grey eyes - her brother had found him, in the unlikely company of an Elf and a Dwarf, hunting orcs on the rolling green plains of the Eastfold. This time, the sense of familiarity was stronger, and for a while she fancied herself in love. At last, here was a man to whom she could give herself, who would save her, who would offer her status and renown. (At the back of her mind, a voice nagged gently that this too was not what she sought; she needed a man who would treat her as simply a fellow soldier, not a man who stood like a statue of an ancient king upon a pedestal. The voice told her that she should seek the man she had dreamt of, who could make her laugh. But again, worn down by war and the shadow and Gríma's presence, she dismissed that voice as idle fancy.)

The illusion of love was sufficiently strong that when the man of Numenor spurned not just her love but her status as a warrior by taking the paths of the dead with his male companions and leaving her behind, she dressed herself in her brother's old gear and hid among Elfhelm's Eored, taking the road south to the battlefield and death.

As she rode, words came to her: _here stands one who desires to defend this land, the people and the ground._ She now knew them to be from the lay of the Battle of Celebrant, but when she thought of them, she always heard them in her head, not in the voice of the king's bard, but in a different voice. A warm, gentle baritone, the voice of a scholar, the voice of one who spoke the Tongue of the Mark as a foreigner, who halted slightly, whose different vowel sounds gave it an exotic tinge. And again, she felt that strange yearning, the yearning she had mistaken for love in the case of Aragorn.

~o~O~o~

In Ithilien, Faramir fought on two fronts: both the enemies of his land, in mortal combat; and the councils of his father, with carefully chosen words (councils in which he had increasingly less faith as time went on). The brilliance of his father's tactics continued undiminished, but Faramir feared that the tactics were being increasingly pressed into the service of a strategy which had a central flaw. And still he, too, got flashes of a past life.

There was, for instance, the day when he took a gash to his leg. As the corporal who had taken over as company healer stitched it (while Faramir bit down on a chunk of wood), again he had a vision, one so vivid it almost took the pain away. No coherence to it – but images sparking against his closed lids, of a woman with grey-blue eyes and dark lashes and long golden hair, crawling through the dust of a far distant desert to tend the wounded. Then later, as he lay fevered and in pain, for a moment he was comforted by the sensation, almost real, of golden hair flowing round him like water. Gradually, over the weeks and months, this image became almost his constant companion and comfort. Osgiliath fell. The vision of that golden hair flowing round both of them was his last conscious thought when the Southron dart pierced his side upon that ill-fated retreat.

~o~O~o~

On the battlefield, as she faced the dark shadowy king, his cold crown glittering above nothingness, his robes tattered, as he rose from the wreck of his fell steed, Éowyn brought to bear all she knew of the art of the sword, and more, knowledge she sensed she had hidden within her. When her shield arm was shattered, somehow she knew to hold her sword in a high guard, and a voice – that same warm baritone voice – said to protect her legs. And somehow, when that small hand reached up from where he lay on the ground, among the fallen, and stabbed the fell king behind the knee, she knew exactly how best to take advantage of the way he staggered, and she thrust her sword home.

As she fell to the ground, her shield arm in agony, her sword arm simply… numb, dead, her last thought was of dark hair escaping from its braid and blowing in the wind.

~o~O~o~

When Faramir turned and saw her in the garden of the Houses of Healing, the sight of her flowing gold hair came to him as if from his recurring dream, like an ancient friend. And when he told her that he had seen flowers fair, and maidens fairer, but none as fair as she, it was as if he had already said those words to her in a past life. And as if he knew that the winning of her would not be easy, but that it would bring joy beyond price.

She looked at him, and saw the lithe, strong figure of her dreams… and panicked. She would not make that mistake again. Not the same mistake as Aragorn, the mistake that had taken her so close to death.

But slowly, over the days that followed, he calmed that panic, gentled her, most of all, made her laugh for the first time in so, so long. Treated her as his equal, talked with her, listened to her. Sang to her, recited poetry (this made her laugh, so incongruous a picture it painted). Promised that when they were both well, he would spar with her. (Would he be skilful? She wondered. Or fast? Certainly, if his quick wits and lightning repartee were anything to go by, he would be tricky. But then, so too could she if she chose.)

Eventually a day came when he spoke plainly of his love, and asked her to marry him, and she realised that this was right, this was the man she loved, this was the man she had waited for.

_And he took her in his arms and kissed her under the sunlit sky, and he cared not that they stood high upon the walls in the sight of many._

~o~O~o~

_AN:As always, thanks to all who have taken the time to review! (Especially those not logged in who I can't PM individually).  
_

_For those of you who want to know what half-remembered something or other sparked Faramir's song game, it is of course "One song to the tune of another" from that Radio 4 classic, I'm sorry I haven't a clue. Google Graeme Garden singing "killing me softly with his song" to the tune of the can can to get a sense of how it goes!_

_As I said in the tags on AO3, this is all about "Having one's authorial cake and eating it." It's choose your own ending time… _

_If you like the idea of them living happily ever after as Prince and Princess of Ithilien you can stop here (safe in the knowledge that in this version Éowyn will remember the concept of the hypocaust from school history lessons, and insist one gets installed in the newly rebuilt Emyn Arnen, along with chimneys and ideally indoor plumbing). _

_If, on the other hand, you think Éowyn yearns for a world where she can be herself (and stop smelling of wet dog), and Faramir yearns for Radio Three, I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, hot showers, comfortable (and capacious) double beds and central heating, then read on… _

_TBC_


	16. Chapter 16

**_Rath Aurost - Ending A_**

_At Altariel's request, I'm filling out a bit of ending A before we go onto ending B. Because Altariel requested a companion piece to "One song to the tune of another," and having supplied me with that wonderful gif of Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman (see comments section on AO3), what Altariel wants, Altariel gets...(possibly because she has "made me an offer I can't refuse" - she will cut off my supply of gifs if I don't provide happy endings all round).  
_

_So here it is – Rath Aurost. With apologies to non-Radio-4-listeners, because this probably won't make any sense. But I promise there will be hay-lofts, and the activities traditionally associated with hay-lofts, in the next chapter. (For the Sindarin buffs among you, I suppose strictly speaking it should be Cû Aurost, but that doesn't roll off the tongue as well.)_

~o~O~o~

Two days after the kiss on the walls, Éowyn, accompanied by a young Rohir whose broken left arm did not prevent him wielding a sword with his right, walked through the streets of Minas Tirith to the Steward's palace. Marshal Elfhelm had made it clear that he did not like the idea of the sister of his king wandering the city on her own. Although it was late morning, there was no real warmth in the sun as yet. The day was sunny but cold; a wind blew from the north and rustled buds and early blossom on the trees. The brightly coloured pennants the people had hung in celebration fluttered on the sharp breeze. Éowyn pulled the blue mantle tight around her.

Leaving her bodyguard with some of the off-duty soldiers of the city, enjoying a warming drink by the brazier in the guard house, she allowed the house keeper to show her up to Faramir's study. As soon as Dame Haleth had withdrawn, Faramir pulled her into his arms and kissed her. She felt the now-familiar spark of homecoming, and the warm surge of desire which seemed to form the constant background to her life now, ebbing and flowing like the tide, but never entirely absent. For a moment they stood, he breathing in the scent of her hair, she content to hear the beating of his heart through his tunic. Then he released her and she took half a step back, brushing his dark hair from his cheek.

"You look tired, my love," she said, taking in the dark smudges beneath his eyes and the crease between his brows, which somehow she knew meant he had a headache. "Dreams?" The word was really more of a statement than a question.

"Aye, last night was a bad one. How did you fare?"

"The same."

He led her over to the low couch, then rang the bell for food and drink to be brought to them.

"What duties have you today?" Éowyn asked.

"None that need take me away from the palace; legal papers to be prepared for tomorrow's council meeting, a visit from the city architects to discuss repairs to the walls and water supply, discussions with the harbour master from Pelargir about the requisitioning of ships in order to bring food to the city, a meeting with Marshal Elfhelm regarding provisioning of the Rohirrim. Will you be content to sit upon the couch, or at a small table, and entertain yourself? I can offer books, drawing materials… I am sure Dame Haleth could find the wherewithal for embroidery if you so chose."

Éowyn laughed. "There speaks a man who has never seen my needlework." She paused for a moment. "Is there nothing useful I can do?"

"Well," Faramir spoke, thoughtfully. "I haven't managed to broach this with Elfhelm yet, but there's also the matter of… what's the Rohirric word? Weregild. So many of your countrymen fell in the defence of my land. Gondor owes them a debt too great for words, but let it not be said we shirk our obligations. Their families must be provided for. Elfhelm has sent some lists of the fallen, and their estates and dependent families. But it's in Cirth, and in Rohirric – a summary would be most useful to me."

"Of course."

Faramir fetched a wooden case with several untidily written scrolls and sheets of parchment, and set them down beside a small table in the oriel window. "Here… You have no idea how grateful I am. I cannot make head nor tail of Elfhelm's hand."

Thus the afternoon passed. Faramir made his summary notes of the legal volumes, Éowyn condensed Elfhelm's hastily scratched records into a more systematic list, and between times, the architects, the harbour master, and finally Elfhelm were met with.

In snatched moments when they were alone, Faramir and Éowyn would retire to the couch and kiss.

"These meetings function as quite an effective chaperone," Éowyn remarked, as Beregond rapped on the door again to announce yet another visitor.

As Faramir jumped to his feet and Éowyn smoothed her dress down, Faramir paused for a moment, as if struck by a thought. He said, hastily, "Oh Elbereth, I should have got Dame Haleth to sit in with us."

"Don't be silly, my love. I am old enough not to need a chaperone, and, having survived the hell that was the Pelennor fields, as you did, such petty rules now seem to me just foolish. Besides, I like kissing you. No, I love kissing you," she corrected herself. "I could happily spend a whole afternoon doing nothing else. And a chaperone would very much interfere with this."

Before Faramir could reply, the door was opened to reveal the last of Faramir's visitors for the day, Lord Húrin, come to discuss the legal cases. However, after he was gone, Faramir decided that his love was, on the subject of kissing (as on all matters), clearly right, and the two of them returned to the couch.

~o~O~o~

"Mmm, I dreamed of doing this to you..."

"In my dreams you liked this… oh, you do like this. Good."

"I thought you would like this..."

"I knew you would love it if I were to…"

"I knew you liked…"

"I know you like it when I…"

And somehow, neither of them noticed the subtle shifts of tense and mood and possibility, swept away as they were on a strong current of desire, albeit desire tempered by a comfortable familiarity, so comfortable neither of them even thought to interrogate the source of it.

"I was right… they do fit perfectly within my hands…"

"Not so fast…"

A slightly sad sigh, as the hands were removed.

"No, no, you misunderstand… I meant, do not be so fast to form a judgement. After all, you may not be conducting the right experiment. Have you taken into account the thickness of my bodice and blouse?"

A deep chuckle as the hands were replaced, then shifted to the laces on the bodice. A pause.

"May I?" A twinkle of amusement. "In the spirit of scientific enquiry, you understand." The twinkle was replaced by a look of pure, unadulterated desire.

A sigh of answering desire. "Yes, oh, yes."

Her fingers wound through dark hair. His lips brushed soft skin, face nestling where he had dreamed of, a place he felt as if he remembered from a previous, happier life, a happy hum of contentment rumbling from deep within him.

"That tune… Is it an invitation?" Though why she should have thought this, of just a wordless fragment of a tune, she could not begin to imagine.

But Faramir's words answered her anyway. "Yes. Please, yes…"

And then he took her by the hand and led her down the passageway to his bed chamber.

Many, many hours later, as the first grey light of dawn crept through the window, Éowyn lay in Faramir's arms, completely sated and – this struck her as just as important – warm and safe and comfortable for the first time in nearly two years, since that half-remembered trek through Anorien. She was dimly aware that just about every moral code of their world – both his country and hers – said they should not have done this, but it felt so completely right that she found she did not care a fig for moral codes. And as well as right, there was this feeling that it had always been right, that this night had merely set things back to how they ought to be.

Later still, as they broke their fast in the small parlour that overlooked the private courtyard in the centre of the palace, Faramir said, "Your guard – will he be discreet?"

"I think so – his family are tenant farmers on what was my mother's dower land, land which now belongs to me. They have always been loyal to a fault."

"I think my cousins will help to cover for me. The house of Dol Amroth has its city palace but a stone's throw away. I think Elphir and his wife will be prepared to agree to a small subterfuge and let it be known that you are 'staying' with them. My servants, I know, will all be the embodiment of discretion. All of which seems rather foolish, for we are to be married, and have only done what the Eldar do in times of strife and unrest, bound ourselves to one another without need for ceremony..."

Then he paused for a moment, looking at her as if to confirm how she felt about this.

She simply smiled and reached out across the table, and covered his hands with her own.

"I am yours, with or without a ceremony," she said, simply.

"I am yours, now and forever more… in fact, I have always been yours, I think, even when I did not know you fully."

~o~O~o~

And so the next month or so, before Éowyn's return to Rohan, passed, blissfully happily. Their domestic arrangements were something of an open secret, but were politely not talked of. The Prince of Dol Amroth and his family cheerfully maintained the pretence that Éowyn was their house guest, Elessar affected not to notice anything at all, and Éomer, on his return from Cormallen, perhaps surprisingly simply took his sister to one side and said "He's a good man, and you have chosen well, at last, but do try not to fall with child if you can manage it – though I suppose with your betrothal happening at harvest-time it would not be too much of a disaster even if you did."

Their handfasting, in Edoras, was a joyous affair. And according to the laws and customs of the Mark, they were expected to live together and share their bed after the handfasting had taken place, so the further ceremony in Minas Tirith, at which they actually married, did not really change anything of importance. It took place the day after Mettarë, which struck both Faramir and Éowyn as deeply appropriate, though they couldn't have said why.

~o~O~o~

Some three years later, Aragorn settled into an armchair by the fire. The public duties of celebrating Mettarë, the turn of the year, in Minas Tirith had been completed. As was beginning to become something of a custom – if two years could be accounted enough to establish a custom – he and the queen had arrived at Emyn Arnen. Last night when they arrived, a grand feast had been laid on in the banqueting hall. In Rohirric style, all the inhabitants of the estate, and the soldiers (and the King's retinue) not on guard duty, were catered for. Tonight however, it had been a small, intimate dinner in the family's private dining room: Éowyn and Faramir had entertained the king and the queen, and also Faramir's able young administrator, Lord Úron, and his wife Lady Siliveth.

They had now retired to the parlour and were sitting in the warm glow of the fire. The whole house was admirably warm – as comfortable as a hobbit-hole, in fact. His Steward's wife had turned out to have something of a genius for domestic engineering, odd, coming as she did, from Rohan. Not only had she insisted upon chimneys (most un-Rohirric), but she had also designed, with the help of Faramir's architects and engineers, a plumbing system which delivered hot water to the bath house through a network of terracotta pipes (one of the engineers had suggested lead as more malleable and easily worked, but she had insisted that this would not be healthy, which the engineer thought a strange superstition, but his employer was not to budged on the issue).

The furnace which heated the water did double duty: all the rooms on the ground floor were perched a couple of feet above the ground on brick piers, and hot air from the furnace was channelled beneath the floors. A _hypocaust_, Éowyn called it, though how she had come up with this name Aragorn could not guess – it sounded like no language he was acquainted with, and as Thorongil he had travelled very widely indeed. She had also (at considerable expense, but significant improvement to the comfort of the house) insisted on double casements on all the windows, one set opening outwards, and a second set opening inwards. Combined with shutters on the outside and thick curtains within, this had to be the most comfortable palace in Gondor (and Arwen was already commissioning architects as part of her plan for several of these features to be incorporated into the royal palace in Minas Tirith).

He took another sip of wine. The latest part of the evening's entertainment, he had to confess, left him somewhat unmoved. They had begun by taking turns to read aloud – from poetry, history or fables, as took the reader's fancy, and Aragorn would happily have continued in this vein. But Lady Siliveth had suggested a parlour game, Faramir's favourite apparently. They would, Siliveth and Faramir assured them, pick up the rules as they went along.

He wasn't.

"Let me see… the Houses of Healing. Well, with it being Mettarë, I suppose I can use Barahir's gambit, and move along the diagonal to… Merethrond." Faramir's voice superficially carried the same seriousness it did when he played chess, but Aragorn could hear the mirth bubbling just under the surface.

"Well played, my Lord," said Úron, seemingly seriously – at least it didn't _sound_ too much like sycophancy.

"Barahir's gambit! A bold move." said the Queen, deadpan.

Contrary to Elessar, she seemed to be getting into the spirit of things. There was a faint hiss of breath drawn in through her white and even teeth. "I think I must counter with… No, first let me check. Are we playing the Fëanorian rules?"

"In deference to your Majesty's heritage, I think we should," Siliveth said.

"In that case, the White Tree."

"And you accused me of boldness," said the Steward, appreciatively.

"Your Majesty..." Aragorn started. He had not noticed Éowyn come to his side.

"Would I be right in thinking you would perhaps prefer a game of chess?"

"Very much so," said her King. "Unless you have any other suggestions? Perhaps a game from your land?"

For some reason, Éowyn suddenly thought of the game she and Éomer had played in private moments in Edoras, remembered (she presumed) from their teenage years in Anorien: _Assassinate, fornicate, hand-fast?_ Oh dear, that really would not do in the current circumstances. She battled against the flush she felt rising in her cheeks.

"Chess will do perfectly."

"Without wishing to cast aspersions, may I offer the sincere hope that you do not play as well as your husband?"

"No-one plays as well as my husband. Well, except possibly the ambassador from Khand."

Éowyn took two pieces, one black, one white, in her hands and put them behind her back. Aragorn tapped her left wrist lightly, and found that he had drawn black. They lapsed into silence for a few moments while each set up their pieces on the board, then they moved to the opening. Aragorn was not particularly surprised to discover that where her husband favoured a considered, deeply thought out game, the White Lady launched into the attack from the outset. Pieces were traded freely, neither particularly establishing an edge over the other, but as a strategy it did have the advantage that it opened up the board nicely, a situation Aragorn much preferred for the middle game.

His concentration was interrupted by Úron's voice.

"In that case I have no alternative but to use Turgon's Tactic, and bore everyone to death while I make good my escape to… The Main Gate."

There was much raucous laughter at the idea of Turgon's Tactic.

"A hit, my Lord. Firmly in the gold," Arwen said.

Aragorn looked at the four of them, his wife and Lady Siliveth curled comfortably on either end of a luxuriously upholstered sofa, Úron sprawling in a carved chair with deep cushions, a goblet of wine at his elbow, and the Steward lying comfortably stretched out upon the hearth rug, head and torso propped up on a heap of pillows and his wolfhound snoozing contentedly across his feet. Utterly relaxed, the trials and tribulations of statecraft completely forgotten. Silly parlour games notwithstanding, _this_ was why he came here.

"Do you know," he said, conspiratorially, to Éowyn, "I must be singularly slow witted this evening, for I am still trying to work out whether that game has rules which I am just too simple to grasp, or whether the point of the game is that it has no rules."

There was another gale of laughter from the four players.

"Having been similarly slow-witted for many years now," said Éowyn, "I have decided it's the latter. What puzzles me is why they find it so funny." She paused. "It's a real _Rupert's _game."

"_Rupert_?" Aragorn asked, with a lift of his brows.

Éowyn grinned. "I think it's a dialect word from my youth in Anorien. _An officer and a gentleman_," she added, in a passable imitation of Faramir's cultured tones.

Aragorn raised his eyebrows still further, a faint smile playing about his lips. "You make it sound as if there's something wrong with being an officer and a gentleman."

"Well, the sort of person who, because of his family and upbringing, was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Has had opportunities others wouldn't have had. Not to say he hasn't lived up to the faith shown in him, and all that… But still, the initial opportunity to show his quality was handed to him on a plate."

Aragorn was fascinated by this turn of events. "You say this… and yet, you are the sister of a king."

"Thrust upon me rather late in life," said Éowyn, with a grin. "I think you know that our grandmother hid Éomer and myself in Anorien after our parents' deaths, fearing some conspiracy or plot in Edoras. I think I had a really quite lowly upbringing, until I was pitched into court life rather abruptly. So yes, Faramir is a _Rupert,_ and I am not, I think. And this game is definitely a _Rupert's_ game."

"And this difference matters?" Really, Aragorn was annoyingly shrewd.

Éowyn laughed and shook her head. "Not really. For Faramir is a good man, a just, courageous, and honourable man. And he'd still be all that no matter what his upbringing had been – that is the man he is. And..." Her voice took on a slightly fierce note. "I love him for it. But I'm still allowed to laugh at how ridiculously _posh_ he is."

She moved a rook into the centre of the board, as Aragorn puzzled over this latest piece of Anorien dialect.

"Check."

Suddenly from behind her, Arwen said "Well, in that case, I'm going to use Castamir's counter-clockwise counter-stratagem, stab my enemies in the front and my friends in the back… _Rath Aurost_!"

The Steward propped himself up on one elbow and reached out to shake her hand. "Well played, your Majesty."

"See, I told you you'd pick it up as we went along," Siliveth beamed.

"And now, perhaps a game of _One song to the tune of another,_" said Úron, getting to his feet and fetching a lute that was propped up in the corner.

~o~O~o~

Later that night, feeling the glow that comes from friendship and relaxation, Faramir and Éowyn finally tumbled into their bedchamber. One of many things to be said for such a warm house, Faramir reflected, was that there was no need to divest oneself of clothes and dive under the covers as rapidly as possible. It might be mid-winter, but it was plenty warm enough for Éowyn to lie upon the bed, clad only in a lace shift, allowing him to admire her beauteous curves. Though the lace shift, in Faramir's considered opinion, was still one item of clothing too many.

Stripping off his own clothes, he climbed onto the bed with the intention of rectifying this situation as soon as possible, only to stop short. He ran his hand over Éowyn's hips and round her middle, then pressed his cheek to the same place. Then murmured, a tone of wonder in his voice, "Do I miss my guess, my love, or is Elboron to have a brother?"

"Or perhaps a sister," Éowyn said, with a laugh. "I have been waiting for the right moment to tell you."

Faramir wriggled up the mattress to lie beside her. She tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled him in for a kiss.

"No regrets about the choices we have made?"

"None."


	17. Fleeing the Golden Cage - Ending B

Autumn was beginning to stir the air in the Mark, when the funeral party returned from Gondor with Théoden's body, ready for burial. Éowyn watched from the steps of the Golden Hall as the cortège approached across the plain. At one and the same time she felt pain at the thought of laying her kinsman to his long rest, and immense happiness at the thought of seeing Faramir. Before he left for Gondor, Éomer had told her of his intention that the two of them be betrothed.

Their reunion was joyful; that evening they sat next to one another at the high table, and though nothing had yet been announced, their feelings must have been clear to everyone who had eyes. Not to mention the fact that since Faramir's choice of place for their first kiss, their love for one another was perhaps best described as an "open secret." _A man with a taste for flamboyant first kisses in public_, a little voice whispered. What a kiss it had been, Éowyn thought. Then that strange little voice came again (or rather, one of the voices, for they were many, and came with different tones and timbres) and said _Not three day old haddock, nor merely romantic, but… _And all at once, she recalled the latest in those heated dreams to which she seemed more and more prone – dreams which now had a face and name attached to the lithe, dark haired body that was hers as she was his.

She felt herself blush, and saw Faramir shoot a knowing glance her way. How easily he seemed to read her face. Another odd fragment of thought came her way, this time delivered as it were in the voice of a teacher or tutor, and oddly, in Westron rather than the language of the Mark. _There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face._ To which her own mind replied, _Oh but there is. There is. _

The evening was a sombre one, but still there was pleasure to be had in good company. Éowyn watched with amusement as his brother reacquainted himself with Lothíriel, princess of Dol Amroth. He'd mentioned, when he got back from the war, that the Prince's house was where he had been billeted while he waited in Minas Tirith for the host to ride out east towards the Black Gate. Torn with worry about his sister, and terrified (to put it frankly) of the prospect to come, he claimed not to have noticed the princess, who was one of the very few women remaining in the city, working in the Houses of Healing.

He had certainly noticed her now, Éowyn thought. In fact, he had noticed her on his return from Cormallen. Many dinners and court dances were held in those long summer evenings, and many an eligible young noblewoman of Gondor had thrown her cap at Éowyn's brother, but (so far as she could tell) he had eyes only for Lothíriel, despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that the princess seemed to treat him simply as one of her brothers' friends.

However, this evening, he seemed perhaps to be getting somewhere at last. The princess had taken his hand for several dances, and now sat beside him, smiling at him as they conversed. Though, to Éowyn's annoyance, a cynical voice in her head – that teacherly voice she'd heard in Westron earlier – said _It h__as been coming on so gradually, that I hardly know when it began. __But I believe I must date it from my first seeing his beautiful grounds._She gave an inward laugh and dismissed this voice as a mere annoyance (after all, she appeared to have inadvertently betrothed herself to a prince – one whose estate lay, after all, in the "Garden of Gondor").

And in any case, the sight gladdened Éowyn's heart. At least for one night, her brother seemed to have shed the weight of kingship and the sadness and guardedness that dogged him, and had become once more the gentle giant she half-remembered from their teens. As she looked at Éomer's face as he danced with Lothíriel she heard another voice – a warm voice, almost fatherly – say words which should have been cynical but were delivered with an unmistakable note of fond good humour: _Then they reach thirty and they settle down with whoever's next to them on the sofa at the time._

Then Faramir had taken her hand and whisked her onto the dance floor, whirling her round to a rapid jig, his hands on her waist. And those hands had stayed there, warm and comforting and intoxicating, for the next, slower dance, as she buried her face against his chest, and he rested his cheek against her hair.

~o~O~o~

Early the next morning, Éowyn woke up. She felt very strange. Part of this was down to the continuing utter confusion of feeling, simultaneously, a fierce joy at being with Faramir once more, and at the same time immense sadness at the thought of laying her uncle to rest. Part of it was that somehow, the very intensity of her emotions had unlocked things she had buried deep within her – in particular, those long, chill nights with the door barred, fingers groping beneath the pillow to check for the hilt of her dagger every time she heard a noise. Then of course there was the worrying number of voices in her head… she was beginning to worry that she might be losing her grip on reality. She had seen this happen to men who'd come back from the battlefield.

But underneath it all was a nagging feeling of the world on a tilt, of things not quite as they seemed, of the key to a puzzle just out of reach. And a sense of impending… not exactly doom, but realisation of some sort. But one which, if, in and of itself, not doom, at least one which would upend the world she knew, turn it on its axis, present her with a choice of some kind. A profound and far-reaching choice.

And not knowing was perhaps the hardest bit of this.

She took refuge in grooming Windfola.

As she rubbed him down with a wisp of hay, then took a brush to his coat, she heard footsteps approaching. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Faramir duck through the doorway. He smiled at her and instantly her heart lifted.

"Have you missed me?" he asked.

The bare-faced cheek of the man! Was he not meant to start by saying how desperately he had missed her. "Perhaps."

"If 'perhaps' is the best you can muster, maybe I should make more of an effort to remind you of why you agreed to marry me," he said, and put his arms around her, drawing her in for a kiss. She tangled her fingers in his hair, letting herself float on a wave of desire, putting her all into the kiss. Eventually, breathless, he broke the kiss and nuzzled the side of her neck, then whispered, "Yes, I have missed you too, and yes, it was remiss of me not to say so immediately."

She chuckled. "Just as well, for we are to be betrothed tomorrow."

"Aye, your brother did tell me… so it will not come as a complete surprise."

She stuck her tongue out at him. Then a thought occurred to her. "And did he tell you of the customs of the Mark regarding betrothals?" She found herself blushing again, but was amused to see an answering flush rise in Faramir's cheeks.

"Your brother did not, but Éothain did. So, we are to be troth-plighted, then bedded?"

Éowyn found herself turning back to Windfola, and brushing him with long strokes, to cover her embarrassment. "It's an old tradition – it stems from a time when it was customary to try out marriage for a year and a day to see if the couple suited one another, and if… if they could produce a child. Then after a year and day, or when a child was on the way, the marriage would be made permanent."

Faramir, sensing perhaps that this was a moment for talk rather than embraces, hopped up onto a stack of hay bales and made himself comfortable.

"You are not worried about tomorrow night, are you? I suppose someone has told you what to expect."

Éowyn definitely couldn't look at Faramir at this point. "Not worried at all. Very much looking forward to it, in fact." _Oh __Béma__, had she said that aloud?_ "Women of the Mark are not shy about such things – I have been told to expect much pleasure." At last she managed a glance over her shoulder, and was immediately speechless. The look on Faramir's face… She thought she had seen desire on his face before, when he kissed her, but she had been wrong. _This_ was what desire looked like.

As if to take the heat out of the situation, he gave a laugh. "My lady, I hope I can live up to your expectations. I fear I may be a little out of practice, for I have led something of a lonely life for quite some time now."

Éowyn quirked an eyebrow at this, and Faramir became serious. He paused for a moment, apparently deep in thought, then spoke.

"I am not entirely sure whether to tell you this, lest you think I am mad, but for, oh, the best part of eighteen months, I have waited for you. I… sometimes I have dreams. The dream I told you of – the great wave of Numenor. And the dream of the sword that was broken that..." For a moment a look of profound sadness washed across his face. "The dream that sent my brother to his death.

"But amongst them I have had happier dreams, dreams of a woman, brave and beautiful and true. A woman with hair of gold that flowed round our shoulders as we embraced. I don't know why I feel it so strongly, but I am certain those dreams were dreams of you."

Éowyn could not frame any words. Faramir looked at her intently, mistaking the reasons for her silence. "You do think I have run mad," he said, a sad note in his voice.

"No, no, far from it. For you see, I dreamt of you too. Of a dark-haired man who was brave, and true, and beautiful, and mine. Who stood by my side rather than trying to cage me. Who fought in honour beside me." She looked at him. "And who made me laugh."

"Made you laugh? Now there's an odd thing to yearn for in a lover."

"After the struggles we have endured for the last year and a half? I think it may be the first thing I'd yearn for in a lover," said Éowyn, smiling at him.

"You dreamt of me?" he said again, his voice filled with wonder.

"For a long time I didn't know it was you. I got rather confused at one point as to which dark-haired man of Gondor I wanted," she admitted, somewhat shamefacedly, then added hastily, "Though thinking about the laughter helped me to realise what I want. You are the only man I have met who can make me feel so joyously happy. And after you kissed me it became very apparent which dark-haired man of Gondor I wanted." This time, she turned to face him and looked him in the eye.

"So dreams where you stood by my side, and fought beside me…" he said, thoughtfully. And returned the look.

"And other dreams. Many other dreams. Not all of them chaste."

"Not chaste?" He smiled at her, a knowing, challenging smile, a smile she felt she had seen before… but where? She could not recall him looking at her like this before, and yet she was sure he had. In any case, a challenge was a challenge, and needed to be answered. She tilted her chin defiantly.

"Not in the slightest bit chaste. And they were very detailed dreams." As she spoke, the images her dreams had conjured flooded over her and she felt her body respond. Desire rose up inside her, and as it did, she could see a matching desire written on his face – _oh yes, she could read his thoughts in his face every bit as well as he could read hers._ "Very detailed. Very vivid. Very… wondrously… pleasurable." She stared straight at him, gauntlet thrown down, waiting for a response.

He cracked first. Just for an instant, his eyes flickered to the ladder up to the hay loft.

"Is that an invitation?" Éowyn asked. As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she was hit by yet another wave of deja vu, but before she could wonder about it, Faramir answered with one word.

"Yes."

In an instant the race was on. Éowyn reached the ladder a hair's breadth ahead of him, and scrambled up it as fast as she could, Faramir hard on her heels. He crawled through the hatch and she dropped the trap door, pulling a sack of grain over it to hold it shut. Then she gave a cry of surprised delight as Faramir put his hands round her waist, lifted her up seemingly effortlessly, and tumbled her into the hay. They kissed, desperately seeking each other's lips, fingers attacking laces and buckles, hands embarking on a voyage of discovery to the glorious, hidden expanses of skin beneath clothing, arms wrapping round one another, limbs twining in a golden chaos of movement, heat and desire.

Afterwards, as they lay in exhausted contentment, Faramir's head cradled on Éowyn's breast, Éowyn glanced down at him, almost tentatively, questioningly, then saw a spark of shared recognition. Taking a deep breath, aware that this might change everything… or nothing, she took the risk of a flying leap into the unknown. And spoke. In Westron, in a dialect that had been untouched for nigh on two years, but came back to her in an instant.

"Bloody hell. How could I have forgotten _that_?"

"The very question I was asking myself. When did you remember?"

Éowyn nuzzled his hair with her lips, then whispered in his ear, letting him know the precise instant. She was rewarded with a deep, sensuous chuckle.

"For me, it was a few moments earlier – the moment when I remembered how perfectly _these_..." His hands roved across her silken skin and found what they sought… "Fitted within my grasp."

~o~O~o~

As they walked, hand in hand, back up the hill towards Meduseld, they encountered Éomer. Éowyn felt Faramir give a start (a guilty one, she guessed), and struggled to keep her own face straight. Éomer, blunt as ever, spoke.

"Sister, dearest, you appear to have straw in your hair." He reached out and detached the offending stalks. "For that matter, so have you, my Lord Steward, but I'm afraid I shall not tidy your hair for you. I'm sure my sister can attend to that." He looked intently at their faces, and his eyes narrowed with suspicion, and Faramir swallowed hard, and thought _Tulkas' rod, I'm for it now._ But he was wrong.

"When did you both remember?" Éomer asked.

To say both of them were stunned would have been an understatement. They both spoke at once.

"You know?" said Éowyn.

"You knew? Since when?" Faramir asked.

"When I started to train Firefoot. He reminded me so much of Maldon."

Éowyn dissolved into helpless laughter, and had to cling to Faramir for support.

"Truly, it was written in the stars that you were destined to become king of the Mark," said Faramir, joining in Éowyn's laughter.

Éomer rolled his eyes. Then said, slyly, "Not often I work things out ahead of you, Faramir. But in any case, the real question is what you want to do about it, now you do know," said Éomer.

Faramir eyed him with puzzlement and suspicion. "What do you mean? Surely things are as they are."

"Hmm," replied his soon-to-be brother-in-law. "Gloves off, I think. Wyn, you hate it here."

Éowyn stopped laughing very abruptly. "I… No… Well, it's not easy… But."

"A cage," Faramir said, thoughtfully. "That's what you told me you feared more than death." He became silent for several moments. Éomer, forced by circumstances to become a wiser man than he had been eighteen months earlier, held his peace. "Is what I offer you in Ithilien going to become your cage? A nicer cage, a cage whose warder loves you more than life itself, but nonetheless still a cage?"

"We can build Ithilien to be how we want it, Faramir," Éowyn said, holding his hand. Faramir noticed though, that already there was a shift in the patterns of her speech, back to the way it had been when they first met. "You'll let me be your equal. We'll rule there together." "

I think we should think about it, slowly and carefully," said Faramir. "Not that I suppose it makes much difference. I'm not sure how we could get back to your world."

Éomer shot Faramir a look. "Did you never give any thought to how Morwen put Wyn and me there? I mean, she couldn't have done it herself." Faramir had the feeling that for a second time in as many minutes, Éomer had been way ahead of him.

"Well, it's not as though I've had much time to think about it, having only just remembered. Mithrandir, I suppose."

"Hmm. Well, I have given it some thought. A lot, in fact. And yes, Mithrandir was my first thought. But actually, I don't think so. I worked it out from some of Granny's old letters eventually. She wrote to some odd people. Obviously, family home in Gondor. But being Numenorean through and through… Elves as well. The Lady of the Wood."

Faramir and Éowyn boggled at this.

"I was mad as hell when I found out. In fact, it almost led to a Dwarf taking my head off first time we met – just because I said something about the nets she cast that few escape, and accused her of sorcery. Though in the end, it turns out she's okay. For an Elf that is. I mean Elves are pretty weird, when you think about it."

Faramir grinned at this summing up. Both of them were rapidly reverting to the speech patterns of their childhood.

"And," added Éomer, "She's also currently here, in the Golden Hall. I'm not saying you have to decide now. But think about it."

"But..." said Faramir, slightly helplessly. "Duty… Gondor..."

"Dude, Aragorn and Arwen are quite capable of holding the ship steady on their own."

"What about you?" asked Éowyn.

"Well, unlike you, I don't have a choice. The Mark needs a king. And I'm it. Also, being a bloke, I fit in just fine here."

Éowyn bridled with indignation.

"Hey, I didn't make the rules. Though I might change some of them, now I can. Anyway, back to the main question. I'm not saying make up your minds right now. Just think about it."

~o~O~o~

_AN: I've stolen a bit of dialogue, and the idea that Faramir might well be surplus to requirements, from Borys's wonderful "Kiss Me."_


	18. Happily ever after

_And here it is, the final chapter (sniff). In which Faramir proves he is indeed worthy of Eowyn's love by taking on the scariest challenge of all... wrestling with the home office. But our noble knight does need to prove his mettle, and faint heart n'er won fair lady._

~o~O~o~

Faramir hung from the strap dangling from near the ceiling of the carriage, swaying in time with the movements of the tube. Truly, this was happiness indeed. He had washed the grime of work from his hands and was on his way to his latest wondrous discovery, a Proms concert. (Mozart, Brahms, Shostakovich, what could be more sublime?) And to make the experience perfect, Éowyn would be home on leave tomorrow.

The decision in the end had not been hard. However much Éowyn tried to convince herself, she was not happy in Middle Earth. And it was no great wrench for him – father and brother both dead, distinctly a spare part since the arrival of the king. When one threw Radio 3 onto the scales as well, the balance tipped decisively.

~o~O~o~

Galadriel had said it was possible for her to send them back to the time and place from which they'd left the modern world. So that was how they found themselves, swept down the rapids of a Welsh river. They had been fished out by the group of kayakers, who had seen the bridge collapse in the distance. When they described what had happened to the police, they'd reported with great sadness that while initially they'd seen three people in the water, the third had gone under before they could get to him. Police divers spent several days trying to find the missing man's body, but were unable to recover it.

Éowyn was given compassionate leave. She and Faramir had told Theo and Jane what had really happened, but it wasn't until Éowyn showed them the scars on her left arm which hadn't been there the day before, and yet which looked like old scars (and the slight bend in her forearm, set without recourse to the stainless steel pins that the modern world would have at its disposal), that they fully believed her.

"Éomer is a king?" Theo said in astonishment.

"A good one," said Faramir.

They dithered over what to tell the children, but in the end, told them the truth (safe in the knowledge that if the children told anyone, it would be dismissed as the fanciful imaginings of children trying to deal with grief before they were old enough to really understand death). Over the following years, the children came to love the stories of Éomer leading the charge across the Pelennor.

For Faramir, there was still the issue of how to make himself at home in the new world. However, it was Jane who had provided the idea, and Farouk who had provided the means. Jane had said idly, one day, "Couldn't you just do a _Day of the Jackal_?"

"What?" Faramir had asked.

"It was a film, decades back… inspired by a true story, I think. An assassin got a passport in a false name by tracking down the tombstone of someone who'd been born the same year as him, but died young, applied for a copy of their birth certificate, then got a passport," Jane had explained.

"Wouldn't work now," Theo had chipped in. "They have births and deaths cross-referenced these days."

But when Éowyn had gone to pick up her bike a few days later, she had returned with some news. "Farouk had a part time mechanic who lodged in the bedsit above the garage. Poor guy went home to his own country for Christmas, and got killed in a hit-and-run. When I arrived, Farouk was boxing up his stuff to send back to his relatives. Anyway, I told him about Faramir (Farouk knows people who know people… if you know what I mean), and he handed me this. Said the rellies probably wouldn't care one way or another about getting it back." She had produced a somewhat dog-eared ID card, the language unknown to any of the others. "Maybe this country doesn't cross-reference birth and death certificates."

Which was how Faramir (feeling somewhat guilty, for deception didn't come naturally to him) came to apply first for a replacement passport at the country's consulate, then, on the strength of the passport, for leave to remain as an EU national in the run-up to Brexit. After that, he moved into Farouk's bedsit (when Éowyn went back to her regiment), and started doing manual labour round the garage for cash in hand. There was now a jam-jar on the mantlepiece of the bedsit, in which he stashed a fiver a week in the hope of saving up enough to turn his leave-to-remain into citizenship eventually. Farouk had kindly faked up a rent book going back several years, and even some utility bills, to provide a paper-trail of sorts.

The bedsit was tiny, but it was his. Theo had provided him with some left-over emulsion to brighten it up, he'd got a bed from Freecycle, and cheap bedding from the supermarket. The junk shop down the road had supplied a small table and a couple of chairs, and he'd spotted a suggestion online on how to make a serviceable bookcase from planks and house bricks. He'd scrubbed the cupboards and filled them with cheap crockery and glasses; Theo had checked the wiring on the rather ancient electric cooker. Jane had given him some pot plants for the windowsill, and Kelly and Callum had drawn him some pictures for the walls. He'd even managed to squeeze in a small sofa.

The first time Éowyn came home on leave and stayed with him, he'd felt so proud that he now had a home (of sorts) to offer her. He thought wryly that once he could have offered her a palace and a country estate. He had even succeeded (here he couldn't help a smile) in becoming a prince. Then laughing at himself, he reflected that somehow this tiny bedsit meant more. And the sofa had proved comfortable, and the bed plenty big enough for two people who in any case wanted to be as close to one another as they could be, and the cooker worked just fine for cooking their meals, and the cheap glasses held wine just as well as expensive ones would have done. As he lay there in the early morning, a sleepy Éowyn in his arms, that cloud of glorious gold hair around his shoulders, yet more lines of Mardil came to him: _She is all states; all princes I/ Nothing else is/ Thou, sun, art half as happy as we/In that the world's contracted thus/ Shine here to us and thou art everywhere/ This bed thy centre is, these walls thy sphere. _

He had settled into a routine. Every evening, he would Skype Éowyn (and mornings too, most days). He worked. He studied. Firstly the language that was supposedly his native tongue – helped by another of Farouk's mates a couple of times a week (just in case the Home Office got on his trail). And secondly English and maths at evening classes a couple of times a week. He could now read and write pretty fluently (he had an ever-expanding shelf of books purchased from the charity shop on the high street – novels, plays, history, geography, popular science – he wanted to know everything about the world he now found himself in), and his teachers said he would be ready for GCSEs next year.

His pride and joy was another discovery in the charity shop – a second hand oboe to replace his hautboy, left in Minas Tirith. It had been in rather a mess when he got it. But Farouk, though not a musician, was skilled at anything mechanical, and with the aid of YouTube, had got the keys and pads into playable shape. YouTube had come to the rescue again, when Faramir needed to work out first the correct fingerings, then track down pieces of music to learn. And Farouk's father was always ready for a game of chess.

Weekends were spent partly round at Theo and Jane's house (they'd adopted him as a member of the family), and partly (of all unlikely activities) playing football. He lacked anything approaching ball skills, but his height, reflexes and background as an archer somehow meant he turned out to be quite a skilled goal-keeper (though the centre half had to take the goal kicks). Again, there was a slightly uncomfortable feeling of having stepped into a dead man's shoes (the former inhabitant of the bedsit having been the previous goal keeper for Farouk's team). But it gave him something to do on a Sunday morning, and, equally importantly, a group of people – gradually becoming friends – to hang out with.

And then there were many sources of complete delight. London was only a train-ride away. The train cost money, but once one was there… The British Museum, the Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, the National Gallery – all these wonders, all of them free. And the joy of simply walking, through the huge city, absorbing the sights, the beauty (and in places, ugliness) of the buildings, walking for miles through the parks, walking along the river banks. Concerts (with the exception of the Proms) were too expensive, but one could go to church services and hear magnificent music for free as part of their religious ceremonies. And if he didn't exactly believe the same things, he was sure Eru and the Valar would understand. After all, had they not forged the whole world with song and music? This world too, he presumed.

And if he felt nostalgic for Minas Tirith, he had discovered (on randomly buying a train ticket one Saturday out of curiosity) that the mellow stone buildings of Medieval Oxford somehow reminded him enough of the city of his birth that they could soothe his homesickness.

No, all things considered, as he sat in the sunshine on the steps of the Albert Hall, keeping his place in the queue that snaked towards the building, he felt truly content.

But things got even better the next day. Éowyn arrived, glowing with happiness at seeing him, but also bubbling over with pride. The access courses she'd been taking online, studying hard in her small amounts of free time, had finally led to the qualifications she needed. She had got the results just the day before she left, and despite being on the brink of exploding with excitement, had managed not to blurt it out to Faramir over the phone, but had waited till she saw him in person. She had enough money saved to buy herself out of the army, and could start medical school as a mature student in September.

They celebrated by going to bed, getting up just long enough to eat a meal and drink some wine, then going back to bed again. As he lay there that night, with Éowyn in his arms, Faramir felt that when she wove their story, despite the moments of sheer horror and despair, taken as a whole, Vairë had surpassed herself.

~o~O~o~

A decade later, it was Christmas eve. The house glittered with the glow of Christmas lights, the tree sat in the corner decked with tinsel and baubles. Éowyn found herself gazing fondly at Faramir as he sat on the (slightly newer, rather larger) sofa, reading aloud to their three children. _The Grinch who stole Christmas, _and their absolute favourite, _Robin Hood._ Who would have thought, in her darkest hours hiding from Gríma in Meduseld, that eventually her life would turn out like this?

Her medical degree had gone well – not without its ups and downs, of course, but nothing she couldn't handle. (In particular, she remembered the very old-school consultant on her first clinical rotation trying to tell them that women couldn't cope with the pressure of trauma surgery. She pulled down the edge of her scrubs to reveal her bullet wound and said firmly that she personally found, when trying to apply a tourniquet under live fire, that the presence of bullets had much more of an impact on one's performance than the possession or otherwise of a uterus.)

In the end though, she'd gone into obstetrics and gynaecology, feeling that really she'd seen quite enough death (no specialism was without death, of course, but at least this way the new lives outnumbered the patients with really poor prognoses). She was now a senior house officer, and enjoying the additional responsibilities that brought.

While she'd been doing that, Faramir had worked quietly at filling in his education in this new world: first GCSEs, then A levels, then a part-time degree in history, which he juggled round looking after first Elboron, then Theodwyn, then little Éomer (how she missed her brother – but she consoled herself with the thought that somewhere out there, he was alive and well and thriving, probably with a wife and handful of children himself, and of course, horses – lots of horses). Faramir's offer to take on much of the childcare had at first astonished her, when he announced that he had discovered (courtesy of an article online) that in Scandinavian countries such a shared approach to parenting was considered normal in the early years. Coming from his background, she had not expected this in the slightest.

Faramir, however, had not really reflected on his background (or at least, not much, and not until slightly later). He had simply spotted an opportunity to do what he wanted to in any case, without adverse comments being passed (or at least, not too many of them – he got a bit of ribbing from the blokes on the football team, partly he suspected, because at least two or three of them secretly wished they had the balls to do it too). It also occurred to him that perhaps it was yet another way of setting the demons of the past to rest, by proving that he was an altogether different man from his father. But mainly it was because he found toddlers endlessly entertaining.

But little Éomer was due to start pre-school this year, and so Faramir had got a place on a teacher training course. Of course, Faramir being Faramir, he still suffered occasional twinges of guilt at the thought that all this was being accomplished on false papers. But he was getting better at living with it. Perhaps inspired by that Christmas day so long ago when Kelly (now a self-assured young woman) had made him play at schools, he wanted to become a secondary school teacher.

And as she'd once dreamed, she and Faramir faced the world side by side, and fought each other's battles (mercifully not literal ones any more), and talked, and squabbled, and made up, and made love. For he was still beautiful, and she still melted at his smile, his voice, his touch, and he still made her giddy with joy. Even if she had to put up with Radio 3. (Though really she harboured a secret fondness for it these days, and, presence, or rather, absence, of the children permitting, there was still one tune that could get her to drop whatever she was doing and leap on Faramir with approximately 30 seconds notice. Faramir, it had to be said, took full advantage of this.)

All in all, both of them couldn't imagine a way in which their lives could have been bettered.

~o~O~o~

_AN: Thank you so much to all of you who have reviewed, followed and favourited this story - your encouragement has been greatly appreciated. And Earthdragon, I hope this sets some of your worries to rest. (I did smile at your review though - 17 chapters into a crazy AU with people skipping between worlds, and general disregard for canon which must have left the good professor turning in his grave, and suddenly you worry about the implications for strict canon... :-D We've all been there as readers I think - that "but, but, but... no... jumped the shark now" moment.)_


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